Changing Tides

Changing Tides is a novel about self-discovery, growth, maturation, and forgiveness. Its primary characters each experience a transformation, a realization about themselves they desperately sought and hungered for even as they deluded themselves into thinking they already knew all they needed to know about themselves.
Dr. Ben Ransome is a marine biologist entirely absorbed in his work. Hudson Jones is a literature student hoping to make a name for himself. Caddie Ransome is the now teenaged daughter of Ben and hasn’t seen her father in nine years and deeply resents how he has abandoned her.
Caddie carries more baggage than most teenage girls as she struggles to find her own identity and to stake a place for herself in the world. She has show more rebelled against her mother in every way she could until, at last, her mother can deal with her no more and ships her off to spend summer with her father. She arrives at his doorstep angry, hostile, and vicious. He had abandoned her and now her mother has rejected her. She “hates” them both and is resolved to make them pay.
Her father, Ben, had realized many years ago that he knew nothing about being a father and that he was too frightened to learn. He and his wife had divorced and he left for Monterey, California to pursue his career and to escape who he was. He engaged himself entirely and deeply into his career because he could not even form the questions about himself he most needed to answer: who was he? He was, in fact, a stranger to himself.
Hudson Jones comes to Monterey pursuing information about a manuscript he has discovered that may shed light on its author, John Steinbeck. In making the journey, he, too, is running away from himself, afraid to deal with his past, his life as it was, and the future he faced. He brings with his guilt and shame even though, as we find out, he deserves neither.
Together, the three wound each other, occasionally deeply, until a very near tragedy brings them together in recognition of who they really are. They become transformed and discover the lives they had never realized they kept themselves from having. Caddie is still a teenaged girl with all the angst of one; Hudson realizes that he cannot hold himself responsible for the actions of others; Ben discovered he had repressed the most important part of himself for too long. He is free to feel both his emotional self and his sexual self, which he had long ignored.
I had little expectation of this book. I thought it was just a gay romance and that I would soon tire of it. Instead, I dug in. immersed myself in it, and hated every time I had to put it down. Rarely does an author portray an angry, confused teenaged girl so insightfully as Ford does in creating the character, Caddie. But he develops each of his characters brilliantly and with a sense of genuine authenticity. Every character is entirely believable.
In fact, the great strength of this novel is the author’s meticulous development of each character, even the ones like Brian who would have only a small role in the overall scope of the novel. While some authors burden the reader with too many details about times, places, events, or characters, Ford leads readers toward a full understanding of the characters. It is detailed, but never is it tiring. That full understanding of the characters is essential to realizing what the novel is really about.
I have rarely, if ever, read a novel which did such a fine job of showing the slow but steady growth and change in each of its main characters. In the case of Caddie, the exposition of her growth is particularly clear and gradual as the novel develops.
Ford is also truly insightful into what makes us all human, all slightly flawed, all hoping to become something better than ourselves.
In the novel, each character is allowed to see the storyline through their own eyes, giving the reader essentially three narrators, yet each narrator is unable to see or appreciate the growth occurring within themselves. Only when the growth is complete does each come to see how much they’ve changed and how much they had hungered for the change even though they hadn’t realized it.
Previously, I read Michael Ford’s Suicide Notes which I believed to be powerful, insightful, and memorable. That book merely demonstrated further the growth as an author Ford made from the time he wrote this one until writing that one. It is entirely unfair to pigeonhole him as a writer of gay romance. His books do include gay romance, but they are about far more than love stories. show less

An excellent story with wonderful characters and both teen f/m and adult m/m romance and sex scenes. One of the main characters is an asexual scientist with little apparent personality until his estranged teen daughter comes to stay for the summer. Both their lives change for the better, and the other main character, the English major, adds a wonderful counterpoint to the story-line of the father and daughter. It would be nice to see this couple pursued further.

Michael Thomas Ford has evolved into an excellent writer of human nature. Marine biologist,Ben Ransome, has forgotten how to live by totally imersing himself in his work. His world is turned upside down by the arrival of his sixteen year old rebellious daughter, Caddie,who he hasn't seen in 7 years. Ben is in the dark when it comes to even talking to Caddie. To further complicate matters,Hudson Jones, a young, gay man on an academic research to find the truth behing the relationship between John Steinbeck and his best friend Ed Ricketts. Ben must come to life and face Caddie's open hostility and his attraction to Hudson. This is not a book to rush through because of Ford's subtle glimpses the reader gets of their own ife.

4 1/2 stars
Excellent, solid read. The three main characters, Ben, Hudson and Ben's daughter, Caddie, are all interesting people who are searching for that most elusive thing for anyone - connections within themselves and with each other.

Ben Ransome struggles to connect with his 16-year old daughter Caddie when she comes to Monterey, California to spend the summer with him, having exhausted her mother's patience. Ben and Caddie have spent very little time together since the parents' divorce nine years earlier. Meanwhile, graduate student Hudson Jones has come to Monterey to do research in the Steinbeck archives located there. The two men meet and Ben begins giving Hudson diving lessons. Caddie, meanwhile, does everything in her power to annoy her father. It is somewhat difficult to believe that Caddie is the one who finally realizes that her supposedly straight father is flirting with Hudson, who is gay, while neither one of the men seems to have a clue as to what is show more going on between them. If you can get past this stumbling block, the rest of the novel is rewarding as Ben questions who he really is, Caddie learns truths about her parents' marriage which she had never known, and Hudson finally comes to grips with ghosts from his past. Unfortunately, the author gets caught up in too much overly flowerly language, which slows the narrative flow. Some judicious editing would have helped make the book a tighter, more satisfying read. show less

Marine Biologist Ben Ransome understands the sea, what he doesn't understand is people. Now, one of the most important people comes to stay with him for the summer, his estranged 16 yr old daughter, Caddie. The sweet , happy child he remembers has been replaced by an angry, wounded stranger who resents everything about her father. The father who walked out on her when she was just 7 yrs old. Hudson Jones has come to Monterey, Calif. to find answers to all of his questions. The young , ambitious grad student believes he has found a lost ,unfinished John Steinbeck novel, that seems to hint at the author's love for his best friend ED "DOC" Ricketts. If he can prove it, his career will be made. Ben and Hudson meet and move from a tentative show more friendship to a surprising, sweet relationship. This novel has many underlying themes and metaphors abound. The writing is fluid and the characters well drawn, but some editing could have tightened the flow of the narrative.. This, I believe, is this author's most personal work yet and very moving in it's simplicity. He has become one of my favorite author's. show less