The World According to Fannie Davis, Bridgett M. Davis
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The World According to Fannie Davis
My Mother's Life in the Detroit Numbers

Author: Bridgett M. Davis

Narrator: Bridgett M. Davis

Unabridged: 10 hr 14 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 01/29/2019


Synopsis

As seen on the Today Show: This true story of an unforgettable mother, her devoted daughter, and their life in the Detroit numbers of the 1960s and 1970s highlights "the outstanding humanity of black America" (James McBride).
In 1958, the very same year that an unknown songwriter named Berry Gordy borrowed $800 to found Motown Records, a pretty young mother from Nashville, Tennessee, borrowed $100 from her brother to run a numbers racket out of her home. That woman was Fannie Davis, Bridgett M. Davis's mother.
Part bookie, part banker, mother, wife, and granddaughter of slaves, Fannie ran her numbers business for thirty-four years, doing what it took to survive in a legitimate business that just happened to be illegal. She created a loving, joyful home, sent her children to the best schools, bought them the best clothes, mothered them to the highest standard, and when the tragedy of urban life struck, soldiered on with her stated belief: "Dying is easy. Living takes guts."
A daughter's moving homage to an extraordinary parent, The World According to Fannie Davis is also the suspenseful, unforgettable story about the lengths to which a mother will go to "make a way out of no way" and provide a prosperous life for her family -- and how those sacrifices resonate over time.

Author Bio

Bridgett M. Davis is the author of the memoir, The World According To Fannie Davis: My Mother’s Life In The Detroit Numbers, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, named a Best Book of 2019 by Kirkus Reviews, and featured as a clue on Jeopardy! She is author of two novels, Into the Go-Slow, and Shifting Through Neutral. Davis is also writer/director of the award-winning film Naked Acts, which was recently re-released to critical acclaim. She is Professor Emerita at Baruch College (CUNY) and the Graduate Center, where she taught creative, narrative and film writing. Her essays have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the LA Times, among other publications. A graduate of Spelman College and Columbia Journalism School, she lives in Brooklyn with her family.

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