East Bay Grease

the long version

In Eric Miles Williamson's debut novel, T-Bird Murphy seeks to gain a foothold in the turbulent and menacing world of '60s and '70s Oakland. While his mother runs with Hell's Angels bikers, T-Bird falls beneath the men's fists and favors, finds solace and hope in the slightest of rewards and day by day, seeks to survive. But through the daily process of survival, T-Bird slowly begins to gather clues about who he is, where he's from, and how, if at all possible, he might escape. It is not long before T-Bird's mother disappears and he is sent to live with his ex-con father behind the Mohawk gas station on the other side of town. There he finds challenges of a different form: schools overrun by gangs, a father who is one blink away from madness, and a trumpet that might offer a way out.