From the author of Sunday Times bestsellers One Child and Ghost Girl comes a heartbreaking story of one teacher's determination to turn a chaotic group of damaged children into a family.
With the narrative force of an epic novel and the urgency of first-rate investigative journalism, this important book delves into the daily workings and life-or-death decisions of a typical American family court system. It provides an intimate look at the lives of the parents and children whose fate it decides. A must for social workers and social work students, attorneys, judges, foster parents, law students, child advocates, teachers, journalists and anyone who cares about our nation's children.
Theresa is a career woman, a mother and a wife. When her mother calls to say there's trouble at her elderly neighbor's house and she's going over to investigate, Theresa has no choice but to get involved. Before the night is over, Theresa finds herself caught up in the harsh brutality of the streets, with a drive-by shooting, a mysterious kidnapping, and more.
Having grown up in a privileged environment, private school student Willa witnesses the tragic collision between the private difficulties of her biological and adoptive families, a situation that is further challenged by the indiscretions of her headmaster and a feminist sculptor's reckless affair. 60,000 first printing.
From debut novelist Nancy Woodruff comes this chilling and beautifully wrought story of forgiveness, renewal, and the ever-elusive second chance. When fifteen-year-old Matt and his family move from Oregon to an affluent Connecticut suburb, the fact that he is home-schooled brands him as more than an outsider -- he is a town oddity. Just when he seems to have made inroads into the closed social circuit, just when he is embraced by a trio of teenage girls and feels his life might be changing for the better, he is responsible for a devastating car crash that leaves two of the girls dead. Tara isn't in the car with her best friends. Instead, she's by her mother Jennie's bedside as she gives birth to a baby girl. While Jennie and her husband Chris mourn Tara's friends, and try to make sense of their eldest daughter's loss and their own new baby, a pervasive sense of blame begins to rain down on Matt. Jennie knows the community's reaction will surely ruin Matt's life. But when she reaches out to him, hiring him to work for her high school reunion company for the summer, Jennie suddenly finds herself vilified as well. In the face of community and family derision, both imagined and real, physical and emotional, Jennie and Matt soon find themselves in solidarity. As their attachment grows, Jennie realizes that she is bound to Matt by more than just compassion -- that the broken child she sought to save is, somehow, reviving her. Someone Else's Child is a deeply moving story of guilt and forgiveness, despair and hope, and the intricacies of love and responsibility. In rich and unforgettable prose, Nancy Woodruff masterfully explores the fraying loyalties that can turn our world upside down in the face of tragedy.
From acclaimed author Torey Hayden comes a relatable memoir about a special education teacher who recounts a transforming and transformative relationship with a former student who overcame abuse. Special education teacher Torey Hayden's first book, One Child, was an international bestseller, thrilling readers on every continent. Their hearts were captured by Sheila, a silent, troubled girl who had been abandoned on a highway by her mother and abused by her alcoholic father, and who refused to speak. As Hayden writes in the prologue to this book, "This little girl had a profound effect on me. Her courage, her resilience, and her inadvertent ability to express that great, gaping need to be loved that we all feel—in short, her humanness—brought me into contact with my own." Since then, Hayden has gone on to write books about many of her students, but her fans continue to ask her, "What happened to Sheila?" The Tiger's Child is her response. Here Hayden tells how Sheila, now a young woman, finally came to terms with her nightmare childhood. When Hayden was working on One Child, she showed the manuscript to Sheila, then a teenager, and was astonished to find that Sheila remembered almost nothing of her troubled younger years. She had no recollection of her many clashes with her teacher as Hayden tried to break through her emotional pain. And although Hayden had managed to get Sheila to communicate and become an active and lively child, Sheila's home life was still very troubled. Her father had been sent to prison when she was eight and Sheila had run away from a series of foster homes until finally she was placed in a children's home. But as Hayden continued to renew her relationship with the teenage Sheila, the memories slowly came back, bringing with them feelings of abandonment and hostility. Overwhelmed by the intensity of her awakening emotions, Sheila was driven to suicidal despair. The Tiger's Child is the touching, inspiring story of how a maturing Sheila came to perceive her mother not as a monster who willfully cast off her eldest child, but as a weak, forlorn, ordinary human being. Able to appreciate her own strength and resilience, Sheila at last is free to overcome the haunting legacy of child abuse.
Tackling divorce and suicide with a warmth and sensitive humor that refuses to be weighed down, Someone Else's Shoes chronicles a road trip that unites three young people in search of family and acceptance. Fans of Sharon Draper, Jo Knowles and Counting by Sevens will be moved by this tale of what brings us together when things fall apart. Twelve-year-old Izzy, a budding stand-up comic, is already miserable about her father's new marriage and the new baby on the way. Then ten-year-old cousin Oliver and his father, Uncle Henderson, move in with Izzy and her mom because Oliver's mother committed suicide only a few months ago. And to make matters worse, Ben, the rebellious 16-year-old son of Izzy's mother's boyfriend, winds up staying with them, too. But when Uncle Henderson--who has been struggling with depression after his wife's suicide--disappears, Ben, Izzy, and Oliver set aside their differences and hatch a plan to find him. As the threesome travels in search of Henderson, they find a surrogate family in each other.
It's the first day of school, and Camilla discovers that she is covered from head to toe in stripes, then polka-dots, and any other pattern spoken aloud! With a little help, she learns the secret of accepting her true self, in spite of her peculiar ailment.
A children's board book about respecting body boundaries. Teaches babies, toddlers, and thoughtful parents that it is okay for kids to say no to hugs and kisses, and that what happens to a person's body is up to them. Inspired by the #MeToo movement, written by a mom, illustrated by a feminist artist, and successfully crowdfunded on Kickstarter. Follows recommendations by child experts about allowing kids to decide when and how to offer affection to others. Helps young kids grow up confident in their bodies, comfortable with expressing physical boundaries, and respectful of the boundaries of others.
“A suspenseful, moving look at twisted maternal love and the limits of forgiveness.” —People “Not only a terrific, spellbinding read but a fascinating meditation on the choices we make and the way we love.” —Elin Hilderbrand, New York Times bestselling author Simply told but deeply affecting, in the bestselling tradition of Alice McDermott and Tom Perrotta, this urgent novel unravels the heartrending yet unsentimental tale of a woman who kidnaps a baby in a superstore—and gets away with it for twenty-one years. Lucy Wakefield is a seemingly ordinary woman who does something extraordinary in a desperate moment: she takes a baby girl from a shopping cart and raises her as her own. It’s a secret she manages to keep for over two decades—from her daughter, the babysitter who helped raise her, family, coworkers, and friends. When Lucy’s now-grown daughter Mia discovers the devastating truth of her origins, she is overwhelmed by confusion and anger and determines not to speak again to the mother who raised her. She reaches out to her birth mother for a tearful reunion, and Lucy is forced to flee to China to avoid prosecution. What follows is a ripple effect that alters the lives of many and challenges our understanding of the very meaning of motherhood. Author Helen Klein Ross, whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, weaves a powerful story of upheaval and resilience told from the alternating perspectives of Lucy, Mia, Mia’s birth mother, and others intimately involved in the kidnapping. What Was Mine is a compelling tale of motherhood and loss, of grief and hope, and the life-shattering effects of a single, irrevocable moment.