I really loved spending time with Mika and her family. This book was literary fiction at its best - showcasing a multi-generational family and everything that happens to them.

Things I loved about this book:
Mika’s voice! I loved seeing her grow.
The different perspectives, from Teeta to Weesie to Major to Rhina.
I loved Mika’s relationship with her grandparents. She and her Teeta had such a bond, and after he passed away, she grew into that bond with her grandmother.
I loved the bit where Mika gets her period for the first time. Whoops! Lol
That final bit of the book with the sweet 16! I teared up. What an amazing last line.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

4.25 stars

The best kinds of stories take you on an immersive journey, and Redwood Court does just that. Author DéLana R. A. Dameron brilliantly crafts a quietly epic intergenerational tale interspersed with various points-of-view and narrative voice styles (first, second, and third person). Combined, these voices weave a beautiful tapestry of a family and how this family interacts with itself as a unit and with their community as a whole.

The prose of the novel feels wonderfully poetic, which speaks to Dameron’s poetry background and her deft ability to take her craft and expand it to literary fiction. The words are soft, yet simultaneously powerful, leaping off the page and painting these characters into existence. And I can’t wait to read more from this brilliant writer.

A sincere thank you to Random House for the ARC.

The author of Redwood Court brings her background in storytelling and poetry to tell the story of multiple generations of a Black working class family in the South. She uses Mika and a genealogy assignment to unfold the story of her grandparents, Weezie and Teeta, to Mika’s family. Interwoven between the focus on family members is the story of the neighborhood and its characters. Again, the author’s background brings an artist’s touch to the storytelling.

This story orbits around a black family in the second half of the twentieth century. Their home is in suburban Columbia, South Carolina in a black neighborhood called Redwood Court.
Dameron populates this novel with wonderful, complex characters who make up this proud, hardworking, and caring family. Together we travel through the postwar American dream, the turbulent sixties, the horrors of war for both the men who fight and their families at home. The families of Redwood Court are social, churchgoing people, and they don't seem to care about privacy. Weesie, the matriarch, can most often be found on the phone, checking in with her neighbors. Her spirit of community is what carries this novel, usually told through the eyes of Mika, her granddaughter.
There are many characters in this book--so many that it begins with not only a family tree, but placement and descriptions of all the neighbors, as each person plays a role in rounding out Redwood Court. Through most of the book, we get insight into this close-knit family, and what it is like to live in such a neighborhood.
The book is well written with smooth, albeit dense prose. Dialect slows the flow of the story into a melodious pace, not unlike the warm syrup of Southern summers. There are joyful parts, and painful parts, and an unforgettable sense of time and character.
This is a book told exclusively from the black point of view. The independent memories of this author sometimes clouded the rendition as told by Mika. We remember slavery, Jim Crow, the Civil Rights movement, segregation, integration, and remember that the world painted did not exist in a vacuum. I applaud Dameron’s work at presenting a time in the history of the USA that should be called out, but I wonder if the calling would be more authentic if all non-Black references didn't feel stereotypical.
The book will release on February 6, 2024. Thanks to the Dial Press, Random House, and NetGalley for this advanced reader’s copy.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for this early read. This was a nice coming of age story that was so easy to read. What I loved about it was that it was so drama free that I had to really think about where the drama was. So nice and sweet.

REDWOOD COURT, debut novel by Délana R. A. Dameron, is the story of a Southern Black family living in a working-class Black suburb of Columbia, South Carolina in the 1990s. It is told primarily from the point of view of Mika Tabor, the youngest daughter of the family, as she comes of age, surrounded by her parents, grandparents and siblings, as well as plentiful neighbors and friends in their cul-de-sac on Redwood Court. Mika’s grandparents, Weesie and Teeta move into Redwood Court just after the Korean War. Despite the Jim Crow laws in effect, the members of this community support one another and try to find joy in their lives when Black people were not given many opportunities. The story continues over several more decades. I enjoyed the warmth and charm of this story as well as the nostalgic look at the past. REDWOOD COURT has happy, sad and humorous moments, but some important messages are also shared. This book would be a good book club selection, with plenty of topics to discuss. Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the chance to read and review an advance reader’s copy.

This debut novel is the story of a black working-class family in South Carolina - their history, their relationships, their neighborhood, and their dreams told through several points of view, but mostly through young Mika's eyes in the 1990s.

Description:
“Mika, you sit at our feet all these hours and days, hearing us tell our tales. You have all these stories inside all the stories everyone in our family knows and all the stories everyone in our family tells. You write ’em in your books and show everyone who we are.”

So begins award-winning poet DéLana R. A. Dameron’s debut novel, Redwood Court . The baby of the family, Mika Tabor spends much of her time in the care of loved ones, listening to their stories and witnessing their struggles. On Redwood Court, the cul-de-sac in the all-Black working-class suburb of Columbia, South Carolina, where her grandparents live, Mika learns important lessons from the people who raise her exhausted parents, who work long hours at multiple jobs while still making sure their kids experience the adventure of family vacations; her older sister, who in a house filled with Motown would rather listen to Alanis Morrisette; her retired grandparents, children of Jim Crow, who realized their own vision of success when they bought their house on the Court in the 1960s, imagining it filled with future generations; and the many neighbors who hold tight to the community they’ve built, committed to fostering joy and love in an America so insistent on seeing Black people stumble and fall.

With visceral clarity and powerful prose, Dameron reveals the devastation of being made to feel invisible and the transformative power of being seen. Redwood Court is a celebration of extraordinary, ordinary people striving to achieve their own American dreams.

My thoughts:
I thought Weesie was phenomenal the way she tried to pull the neighborhood community together and make sure everyone was included and felt cared for. The neighborhood was friendly and looked after their families, who were close, and I really liked that. It was sad the family couldn't trace their roots which was a result of slavery where so many were disbursed and didn't know their families. However, this is not a book about slavery, but of the love of a family and their day to day lives. The characters in the story are central and drive the plot. The writing is beautiful and I enjoyed reading it.

Thanks to Random House, The Dial Press through Netgalley for an advance copy.

Congratulations to DeLana R. A. Dameron for helping me see the world and the complexity of growing up through another pair of eyes. I lived in a very rural area of CT that had absolutely no diversity and raised our three daughters about 30 minutes away in another rural town with very little diversity. I also taught elementary school for 38 years. Although I never gave an assignment like the one Mika was assigned, reading the passages about her conversations with Teeta about the assignment made my jaw drop and sent me reeling. It is so very hard to imagine what it was like, as well as what it still must be like, to grow up under different circumstances.
I loved how tight knit the family was, and how they supported each other. I especially loved the relationship between Mika and Teeta. I knew three grandparents growing up but unfortunately none of them were anything like Teeta and Weesie. I barely knew them and they barely knew me.
The list and explanations of the characters at the beginning was helpful and I wish I had printed it out for easy reference as I was reading - one of the only drawbacks of reading this book on a kindle which I can’t navigate easily. I have to admit that the many points of view were confusing at times but then again, they added so much color to this character driven story.
There must be many Redwood Courts throughout this country but I doubt that any of them come close to the magical place depicted by Dameron.
One passage, when Mr. Mosby was in the hospital, spoke so loudly to me, “…I understood he was teaching me to leave this world on your own terms - a soldier’s death.” Dameron’s interspersed passages truly brought laughter and tears to my eyes throughout this read, but most of all she helped open my eyes to the reality that racial biases and barriers still exist and the battles faced by others to overcome those barriers. Powerful writing indeed.
Many many thanks to DeLana R. A. Dameron, the Dial Press, and NetGalley for affording me the privilege of reading an arc of this soon to be published gem.

Great read about an African American family in South Carolina.

The story is told from multiple points of view and at times I found it hard to keep up with who was related to whom.

The strength of this book lies in the small events are monumental. It shows about love between family members. It leaves you feeling nostalgic and warm.

Would highly recommend this book.

I enjoy reading historical fiction. This book was set in 1960s-1990s. All the changes of the black community during this time. I loved reading how close the village was and the family love.The family support and affection was strong & needed.

But at times it was very hard to follow with so many characters. Some parts dragged on & I became a bit distracted.

Overall it was refreshing to read of middle class black Americans making their way during a tough time. There is no generational trauma..I would recommend this book.
I received a complimentary copy of this book from NetGalley . Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I really wanted to like this book about a Black family from Columbia, SC set mostly from the 1960's-1990's. There were some great characters and the sense of family and neighborhood were strong. However the narrator often changed, sometimes in the middle of the chapter, which was confusing. I mixed up characters and their experiences because of it.

Délana R. A. Dameron’s Redwood Court is a delightful, touching surprise of a debut novel. Opening with a middle schooler’s family history assignment for social science class, the book tells the multigenerational story of a black family. Having bought their dream home on Redwood Court, a cul de sac in a new all-black Columbia, South Carolina neighborhood, James (“Teeta”) Mosby and wife Louise (“Weesie”), born in the 1930s) raise their children and later host their grandchildren. It is their daughter Rhina’s younger daughter Mika (born 1985), the only black student in her class, who consults the family about how to handle the social science assignment when her ”immigrant” ancestors were slaves.

Unlike so many recent novels focusing on black generational trauma, Dameron portrays a loving, supportive family, generally happy, with a mix of funny, touching, sad, and occasional troublesome moments. Granted, some anecdotes involve racism, but the family does not allow itself to be defined by those moments.
Clearly marked shifting viewpoints allow family stories to come to life as readers experience their daily lives—work, school, shopping, barbecues, fishing trips, card games, and much more. Now and then, a story told from one person’s point of view will recur later from another point of view, adding depth and meaning to the experience. Readers not only get o know three generations of the family, but also meet neighbors, distant out-of-town relations, and even a teenage foster child on the verge of aging out of the system.

The author includes a descriptive list of characters at the front of the book, helping readers keep track of all close family members, out-of-town distant relations, and Redwood Court neighbors. Dameron’s use of enticing chapter titles made me anticipate what lay ahead and sometimes took on surprising meanings, among them “Working My Way Back to You, Babe,” “Cinderelly, Cinderelly, “Thirty-second Annual Chitlin Strut,” “Rollin’ with My Homies,” and "Call a Spade a Spade.”

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for an advance reader copy of this engrossing and emotion-packed new book. I will look forward to more from Délana R. A. Dameron.

Redwood Court has my heart. As a 80's born baby and a child of the 90's, I felt like I understood Mika so much. I'm a white woman so my obviously my life and struggles are different from Mika's but so similar as well. I was very close to my maternal grandparents. We spent every Friday after school there until after dinner. On Saturday's we went over as soon as we were done with lunch and most of the time, either my brother or I spent the night on Friday or Saturday nights. On Sunday's we had Sunday lunch with them after church and didn't go home until evening. My granddaddy liked to take us for rides and see people he knew or go sit at the creek in similar ways to Mika's Teeta. My mom's brother was constantly involved with drugs and in trouble with the law and similarly was locked up when my granddaddy passed. The beginning of Redwood Court focuses a lot of Mika and Teeta's relationship and boy, did that leave me with an ache over the loss of my grandaddy. Currently, my other granddaddy isn't doing well and I live so far away from my family that I got a huge case of homesickness. Redwood Court highlights the culture of the 90's and it was a nostalgic walk through that time period especially with in home computers, internet at home, burning cds and y2k. Redwood Court made me feel a lot of things. I laughed and cried through much of it but maybe nostalgia is what shone through the most. It was a trip down memory lane from my own childhood. The good ole days. The ending felt abrupt in that I wasn't ready for it to be over. I wanted more of Mika's story. I want to know if she ever dates Roger and what happens after she graduates high school. I'll miss Weesie and Mika and the rest. They felt like family.

I have a particular fondness for family saga novels, and Redwood Court was presented as a tale centered around a family residing on Redwood Court in Columbia, SC. The narrative unfolds through the perspective of Mika, offering insights into the challenges faced by her parents and grandparents.

Throughout my reading experience, I found it challenging to fully engage with the storyline. I repeatedly wondered about the direction of the plot and felt that events lacked meaningful development. Each narrative presented a glimpse into the family's life, but the threads were often left hanging without resolution. The lack of continuity left me questioning, "What happens next?"

It wasn't until I approached the conclusion that I grasped the nature of the book – a compilation of distinct stories. While all revolving around the same family, these narratives lacked a cohesive timeline and struggled to establish meaningful connections with each other beyond the shared familial backdrop.

Had I been aware that the book comprised short stories, I might not have chosen it. Whether intentional by the author and publisher or not, the disjointed nature of the narratives nearly led me to abandon the book on multiple occasions. However, my commitment to providing a review for the advance readers copy kept me pushing through to the end.

I thought this was a beautifully woven story about generations of a Southern Black family told through the lens of the youngest girl, Mika, who is being raised in the 90s. It deals with the story of her grandparents, her parents, and herself with all the other family and friends along the way. It talks about how Redwood Court was created and the different opinions of the area. It is a beautifully written composite of a difficult story matter. Highly recommend reading this one.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for advanced copy, and I give my review freely

Genre: Fiction, Family Saga
[TW: Death of a loved one, incarceration, systemic racism]

“You know, you sit at our feet all these hours and days, hearing us tell our tales. You have all these stories inside you— that’s what we have to pass on— all the stories everyone in our family knows and all the stories everyone in our family tells. You have the stories you’ve heard and the ones you’ve yet to hear. The ones you’ll live to tell someone else. That’s a gift that gives and gives and gives. You get to make it into something for tomorrow. You write ’em in your books and show everyone who we are.”

Redwood Court is an incredible debut with a unique and beautiful writing style. Redwood Court follows a Black family living in the Southern United States in the 1960s as they create their family, expand their community, and actualize the “American Dream”. The story is primarily told from the point of view of the youngest member of the family, Mika, however there are several points of view through the story including the matriarch of the family Weesie, Teeta the patriarch of the family, and Mika’s mother, Rhina. Dameron’s writing style is both beautiful and unique and each chapter reads as it’s own short story that amplifies the Black experience in a world of systemic and systematic racism, microaggressions, and The American Dream.

Dameron’s writing captivated me from the beginning and continued to draw me back for more - it is clear that while this is her debut novel, she’s made a name for herself as a poet. I fell in love with the tenacity, emotion and love of each character in this novel and I suspect every reader will feel the same way. I would also be remiss if I didn’t mention all of the 90s nostalgia thrown into the book - Jagged Little Pill, Y2K, AIM - that threw me right back into my own youth in the 90s.

Overall, a unique and well done story about the tribulations of being a young girl in the 90s as well as the additional struggles of being told about the American Dream while living in a world that keeps that just out of reach.

There were some truly lovely moments in this debut novel, scenes of fierce family love that moved me deeply. Through slice of life chapters that read like self-contained short stories, DéLana R.A. Dameron explored multiple generations of a Southern Black family coming of age, finding their places in the world, and celebrating the thriving community they made on Redwood Court. While there were some very powerful chapters, overall I found the novel a little too disjointed for me to feel familiar with the characters, especially as the narration often switched partway through a chapter. I also felt a bit aimless while reading; though plot was not the main goal of the story, I did wonder where exactly the stories were leading, and I’m not sure the ending was entirely satisfying for me.

Thank you to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I typically love family dramas, but there were way too many characters in this novel to keep up with.

This highly autobiographical debut novel centers around a Black family in Columbia, South Carolina, in the latter part of the 20th century. Primarily told through the eyes of Mika, a young girl coming of age in this tight-knit community, the novel also looks back at her grandparents, Teeta and Weesie, as they purchase a home on Redwood Court after the Korean War. The story meanders through the family members' lives, exploring themes of ancestry, community, and the American Dream. I was distracted by a chapter near the end of the book where the voice suddenly and purposelessly switches to second person, and overall I would have preferred a stronger narrative arc, but I did enjoy this novel.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the free ARC.

A gentle tale of a family in 1990s South Carolina- told by multiple members but mostly by Mika, the youngest. It's her diary that most engaged me. There are problematic moments and moments of grace. Nothing much really happens in terms of family drama but that's true for most real families, isn't it, and that's the appeal of this. Dameron clearly likes her characters. Thanks to netgalley for the ARC. A very good read.