Best-known for her trip across the desert that became a bestselling book, the nomadic adventurer now tells the full story of her life.
, “before” and “after”. “Before” lasts until Davidson was 11, when there was still a family that included her parents, sister and dog. There was music, singing, gatherings, story-telling and love, everything that makes a home. The “after” is introduced early and brutally on the third page when her mother dies by suicide.
Davidson’s mother died the same day that they had clashed over what shoes she should wear to school, and Davidson had won a rare victory: “Aren’t you even going to kiss me goodbye?” her mother had asked. Her daughter flounced out of the house: “No, I won’t.” Her memoir segues between the past and present, and it becomes clear as the brilliant constellations of the night sky that her father would map out for her, that this defining event created the extraordinary adventurer and writer Davidson was to become.
The word “catastrophic” appears and reappears, and her depression and then almost total breakdown followed what seems like an inevitable progression. Through miniature vignettes, we come to understand that her mother suffered from depression – did she pass that on to her daughter, or did Davidson’s childhood circumstances create it? What the nomadic adventurer lacked was a foundation, and when the collapse happened it was extreme.