Best of
Poverty

2016

Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City


Matthew Desmond - 2016
    Evicted transforms our understanding of poverty and economic exploitation while providing fresh ideas for solving one of 21st-century America's most devastating problems. Its unforgettable scenes of hope and loss remind us of the centrality of home, without which nothing else is possible.

The Maid's Courage


Rosie Goodwin - 2016
    After a series of drunken mistakes, her father is imprisoned for murder, and Ginny and her little brother Charlie lose the only home they've ever known. Worse is to come. Charlie is only eight years old and has a weak chest. Ginny is determined to keep him with her, but he is taken to the workhouse before she has a chance to save him. Lonely and desperate, Ginny wanders the streets of Nuneaton. She finds honest work at the pie shop - until she is forced to fight off the unwanted advances of the baker and she's out on the streets. It's only then that she remembers her father's final words - the housekeeper of Lamp Hill Hall will help her. Soon Ginny is employed as a laundry maid, the very lowest rung of the ladder. Her beauty and grace mean that she catches the eye of the house's mistress, who raises Ginny up to play lady's maid to the difficult and demanding Miss Diana. All Ginny wants is to find her brother - and it will take all her strength of heart and courage to bring her family together again.

Ada's Violin: The Story of the Recycled Orchestra of Paraguay


Susan Hood - 2016
    She dreamed of playing the violin, but with little money for anything but the bare essentials, it was never an option...until a music teacher named Favio Chávez arrived. He wanted to give the children of Cateura something special, so he made them instruments out of materials found in the trash. It was a crazy idea, but one that would leave Ada—and her town—forever changed. Now, the Recycled Orchestra plays venues around the world, spreading their message of hope and innovation.

The Wandering Tree


Daniel Wimberley - 2016
    Wearing thrift store clothes, praying to the gods of adolescence that some loud-mouthed kid doesn't recognize his old shirt. Building up firewood reserves while other boys are out popping fly balls without a care in the world. It’s a relentless condition without a single redeeming quality. Of course, being poor is something that Lincoln has had time to accept. That his father is a convicted murderer, on the other hand... well, that's a fresh wound that’ll take some getting used to. And soon enough it’ll be the least of his problems. Yet all is not lost. Because in a long neglected hayfield, something extraordinary is happening—something so contrary to human thinking that the rules of possibility begin to unravel. And for a boy like Lincoln, it doesn’t merely change the way he sees the world.It changes everything.

A Bike Like Sergio's


Maribeth Boelts - 2016
    His friend Sergio reminds him that his birthday is coming, but Ruben knows that the kinds of birthday gifts he and Sergio receive are not the same. After all, when Ruben’s mom sends him to Sonny’s corner store for groceries, sometimes she doesn’t have enough money for everything on the list. So when Ruben sees a dollar bill fall out of someone’s purse, he picks it up and puts it in his pocket. But when he gets home, he discovers it’s not one dollar or even five or ten—it’s a hundred-dollar bill, more than enough for a new bike just like Sergio’s! But what about the crossed-off groceries? And what about the woman who lost her money? Presenting a relatable story told with subtlety and heart, the creative team behind Those Shoes pairs up again for a satisfying new picture book.

Doctor Turner's Casebook


Stephen McGann - 2016
    The Christmas edition is always reviewed as a 'must see' event, just as important to some families as the Queen's Speech. All the principal actors are now household names and one in particular over the past two seasons has dramatically come to the front of the show - Doctor Turner, played by Stephen McGann. He is now seen as the lynchpin of the series, not only overseeing the many childbirths across episodes, but also dealing with a multitude of diseases that strike the young, as accurately portrayed by the show's writer Heidi Thomas. Polio, meningitis, measles, scarlet fever and thalidomide have all been meticulously depicted on the show. This new book, will now reveal how a local doctor - such as Dr Turner - not only dealt with such cases, but also how he worked within the newly created National Health Service, as well as lived alongside his East End community. It will be a facsimile as well as a fictionalised diary from the character, all conceived and written by the show's writer Heidi Thomas. Stephen McGann will also contribute his own narrative having studied for an MA in medical studies. Beautifully designed, it will make a lovely present for any fan of the series, as well as those wishing to find out more about the history of what life was really like in this period.

How (Not) to Start an Orphanage: ... by a woman who did


Tara Winkler - 2016
    . .Tara Winkler first arrived in Cambodia to join a tour group in 2005 and was taken to visit a small orphanage in Battambang. The children were living in extreme poverty, and Tara was determined to raise money to help them.Two years later, after fundraising in Australia, Tara returned to Battambang only to discover that the same children were in deep trouble. Her spontaneous response was to find them a new, safe, home. With a team of committed locals and support from friends, she established the Cambodian Children's Trust (CCT).With an instant family of fourteen children and three dogs, Tara had to learn a lot, very fast. And, along the way, she realised that many of the actions she took with good intentions were not at all what the children needed - or indeed, what any child needs. CCT now helps vulnerable children to escape poverty and be cared for within their families.In this compelling, poignant and funny memoir, Tara shares the many joys and the terrible lows of her journey thus far with honesty and passion. Written with co-writer, Lynda Delacey, How (Not) to Start an Orphanage is a book that will keep you thinking long after you turn the final page.

Down, Out, and Under Arrest: Policing and Everyday Life in Skid Row


Forrest Stuart - 2016
    Usually for doing little more than standing there. Juliette, a woman he met during that time, has been stopped by police well over one hundred times, arrested upward of sixty times, and has given up more than a year of her life serving week-long jail sentences. Her most common crime? Simply sitting on the sidewalk—an arrestable offense in LA. Why? What purpose did those arrests serve, for society or for Juliette? How did we reach a point where we’ve cut support for our poorest citizens, yet are spending ever more on policing and prisons? That’s the complicated, maddening story that Stuart tells in Down, Out and Under Arrest, a close-up look at the hows and whys of policing poverty in the contemporary United States. What emerges from Stuart’s years of fieldwork—not only with Skid Row residents, but with the police charged with managing them—is a tragedy built on mistakes and misplaced priorities more than on heroes and villains. He reveals a situation where a lot of people on both sides of this issue are genuinely trying to do the right thing, yet often come up short. Sometimes, in ways that do serious harm. At a time when distrust between police and the residents of disadvantaged neighborhoods has never been higher, Stuart’s book helps us see where we’ve gone wrong, and what steps we could take to begin to change the lives of our poorest citizens—and ultimately our society itself—for the better.

The Boy with Two Lives


Abbas Kazerooni - 2016
    His cousin packs him off to boarding school, infrequent phone calls are his only contact with his beloved mother, and he eventually finds himself homeless at the age of 13. Abbas's extraordinary resilience in the face of overpowering odds makes this story, based on true events, inspiring and unforgettable.

Lucky Strikes


Louis Bayard - 2016
    Harley Blevins, local king and emperor of Standard Oil, is in hot pursuit to clinch his fuel monopoly. To keep him at bay and her family out of foster care, Melia must come up with a father, and fast. And so when a hobo rolls out of a passing truck, Melia grabs opportunity by its beard. Can she hold off the hounds till she comes of age?

Once a Cop: The Street, the Law, Two Worlds, One Man


Corey Pegues - 2016
    As an adult, he became a high-ranking police officer.In this fascinating look at life on both sides of the law, Corey Pegues opens up about why he joined the New York Police Department after years as a drug dealer. Pegues speaks honestly about the poor choices he made while coming of age in New York City during the height of the crack epidemic. He’s equally candid about why he turned his life around, and takes you inside the NYPD, where he becomes a decorated officer despite bureaucratic pitfalls and discriminatory practices. Written with the voice and panache of someone who knows the streets, Once a Cop is a credible and informative look at the forces that lead some into a life of crime and what it means to make good on a second chance.

Poems: New and Selected


Ron Rash - 2016
    The haunting memories and shared histories of these people—their rituals and traditions—animate this land, and are celebrated in Rash’s crystalline, intensely imagined verse.With an eye for the surprising and vivid detail, Ron Rash powerfully captures the sorrows and exaltations of this wondrous world he knows intimately. Illuminating and indelible, Poems demonstrates his rich talents and confirms his legacy as a standard-bearer for the literature of the American South.

Slow Kingdom Coming: Practices for Doing Justice, Loving Mercy and Walking Humbly in the World


Kent Annan - 2016
    The road can be so challenging and the destination so distant that you may be discouraged by a lack of progress, compassion or commitment in your quest for justice. How do you stay committed to the journey when God's kingdom can seem so slow in coming? Kent Annan understands the struggle of working for justice over the long haul. He confesses, "Over the past twenty years, I've succumbed to various failed shortcuts instead of living the freedom of faithful practices." In this book, he shares practices he has learned that will encourage and help you to keep making a difference in the face of the world's challenging issues. All Christians are called to do justice, love mercy and walk humbly in the world. Slow Kingdom Coming will guide and strengthen you on this journey to persevere until God's kingdom comes on earth as it is in heaven.

GodPretty in the Tobacco Field


Kim Michele Richardson - 2016
    RubyLyn Bishop is luckier than some. Her God-fearing uncle, Gunnar, has a short fuse and high expectations, but he’s given her a good home ever since she was orphaned at the age of five. Yet now, a month shy of her sixteenth birthday, RubyLyn itches for more.Maybe it’s something to do with the paper fortunetellers RubyLyn has been making for townsfolk, each covered with beautifully wrought, prophetic drawings. Or perhaps it’s because of Rainey Ford, an African-American neighbor who works alongside her in the tobacco field, and with whom she has a kinship, despite her uncle’s worrisome shadow and the town’s disapproval. RubyLyn’s predictions are just wishful thinking, not magic at all, but through them she’s imagining life as it could be, away from the prejudice and hardship that ripple through Nameless.Atmospheric, poignant, and searingly honest, a Coalminer's Daughter meets Winter's Bone, GodPretty in the Tobacco Field follows RubyLyn through the course of one blazing summer, as heartbreaking revelations and life-changing decisions propel her toward a future her fortunetellers never predicted.

The Weight of Shadows: A Memoir of Immigration & Displacement


José Orduña - 2016
    Though grateful to his parents for their many sacrifices, which resulted in his citizenship, he feels anger and resentment towards a punitive and racist government. With a searingly original voice, Orduna reflects on the complicated and contradictory experience of morphing into a legal young, brown immigrant. He describes the absurd feeling of being given a piece of paper his naturalization certificate handed to him by a robed judge to certify something he has always known: he has a right to be here and is, at least in theory, equal under the law. A trenchant exploration of race, class, and identity, "The Weight of Shadows" chronicles the process of becoming a North American citizen in a post-9/11 United States."

Make It Zero: The Movement to Safeguard Every Child


Mary Frances Bowley - 2016
    But for the millions of at-risk children in America, this is nearly impossible, because trauma clouds their lives like a heavy fog, and in that fog they lose their hope. Make it Zero is a call to bring it back to them.Tying shocking statistics to real stories, Make it Zero explores various forms of childhood vulnerability and offers specific ways for everyone to help end it-for good. It reveals the world of opportunity behind a single moment of compassion, and it teaches us that when we help the hopeless dream again, we ourselves come more alive.This book is for everyone. It's for moms of children they love. It's for men who are protective of those they care about. It's for anyone who lives in a community where there are children. It's for college students and nurses and bus drivers and grandparents and aunts and uncles. The bottom line is this: if one child in America is unsafe and unprotected, then they're all at risk.Each of us is only one person, but one person determined to act is powerful. Moments can multiply into movements and create groundswells of change. Make it Zero is your moment. To be inspired. To be empowered. To join the movement of restoring hope to every child.

The Patchwork Bike


Maxine Beneba Clarke - 2016
    That's when you and your brothers get inventive and build a bike from scratch, using everyday items like an old milk pot (maybe mum is still using it, maybe not) and a used flour sack. You can even make a numberplate from bark, if you want. The end result is a spectacular bike, perfect for going bumpity-bump over sandhills, past your fed-up mum and right through your mud-for-walls home.A delightful story from multi-award-winning author Maxine Beneba Clarke, beautifully illustrated by street artist Van T Rudd.

Coming of Age in the Other America


Stefanie DeLuca - 2016
    Coming of Age in the Other America shows that despite overwhelming odds, some disadvantaged urban youth do achieve upward mobility. Drawing from ten years of fieldwork with parents and children who resided in Baltimore public housing, sociologists Stefanie DeLuca, Susan Clampet-Lundquist, and Kathryn Edin highlight the remarkable resiliency of some of the youth who hailed from the nation’s poorest neighborhoods and show how the right public policies might help break the cycle of disadvantage.Coming of Age in the Other America illuminates the profound effects of neighborhoods on impoverished families. The authors conducted in-depth interviews and fieldwork with 150 young adults, and found that those who had been able to move to better neighborhoods—either as part of the Moving to Opportunity program or by other means—achieved much higher rates of high school completion and college enrollment than their parents. About half the youth surveyed reported being motivated by an “identity project”—or a strong passion such as music, art, or a dream job—to finish school and build a career.Yet the authors also found troubling evidence that some of the most promising young adults often fell short of their goals and remained mired in poverty. Factors such as neighborhood violence and family trauma put these youth on expedited paths to adulthood, forcing them to shorten or end their schooling and find jobs much earlier than their middle-class counterparts. Weak labor markets and subpar postsecondary educational institutions, including exploitative for-profit trade schools and under-funded community colleges, saddle some young adults with debt and trap them in low-wage jobs. A third of the youth surveyed—particularly those who had not developed identity projects—were neither employed nor in school. To address these barriers to success, the authors recommend initiatives that help transform poor neighborhoods and provide institutional support for the identity projects that motivate youth to stay in school. They propose increased regulation of for-profit schools and increased college resources for low-income high school students.Coming of Age in the Other America presents a sensitive, nuanced account of how a generation of ambitious but underprivileged young Baltimoreans has struggled to succeed. It both challenges long-held myths about inner-city youth and shows how the process of “social reproduction”—where children end up stuck in the same place as their parents—is far from inevitable.Stefanie DeLuca is associate professor of sociology at Johns Hopkins University.Susan Clampet-Lundquist is associate professor of sociology at Saint Joseph’s University.Kathryn Edin is Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University.

To Be Cared For: The Power of Conversion and Foreignness of Belonging in an Indian Slum


Nathaniel Roberts - 2016
    Focusing on the decision by many women to embrace locally specific forms of Pentecostal Christianity, Nathaniel Roberts challenges dominant anthropological understandings of religion as a matter of culture and identity, as well as Indian nationalist narratives of Christianity as a “foreign” ideology that disrupts local communities. Far from being a divisive force, conversion integrates the slum community—Christians and Hindus alike—by addressing hidden moral fault lines that subtly pit residents against one another in a national context that renders Dalits outsiders in their own land." Read an interview with the author on the Association for Asian Studies' #AsiaNow blog.

Humans of Minneapolis


Stephanie Glaros - 2016
    Humans of Minneapolis is a curated collection of the best photos and interviews from Glaros's popular blog. In it, we hear surprising and moving accounts of joy, loss, transformation, and community. A project that bridges social divides, Humans of Minneapolis sets aside our differences and creates positive reverberations throughout the city.

Galatea's Revenge


Kelly McClymer - 2016
    When she realizes her husband will never consider her anything more than a gutter brat, she demands that he undo all that his father did in teaching her to be a lady so she can once again survive on the streets of London. Can seeing his wife on the streets of London finally show Damian the true lady within his guttersnipe bride?

Vagrant Nation: Police Power, Constitutional Change, and the Making of the 1960s


Risa Goluboff - 2016
    The criminal justice system-and especially the age-old law of vagrancy-played a key role not only in maintaining safety and order but also in enforcing conventional standards of morality andpropriety. A person could be arrested for sporting a beard, making a speech, or working too little. Yet by the end of the 1960s, vagrancy laws were discredited and American society was fundamentally transformed. What happened? In Vagrant Nation, Risa Goluboff provides a groundbreaking account ofthis transformation. By reading into the history of the 1960s through the lens of vagrancy laws, Goluboff shows how constitutional challenges to long-standing police practices were at the center of the multiple movements that made the 1960s. Vagrancy laws were so broad and flexible that they madeit possible for the police to arrest anyone out of place in any way: Beats and hippies; Communists and Vietnam War protestors; racial minorities, civil rights activists, and interracial couples; prostitutes, single women, and gay men, lesbians, and other sexual minorities. As hundreds of thesevagrants and their lawyers claimed that vagrancy laws were unconstitutional, the laws became a flashpoint for debates about radically different visions of order and freedom. In Goluboff's compelling portrayal, the legal campaign against vagrancy laws becomes a sweeping legal and social history ofthe 1960s. Touching on movements advocating civil rights, peace, gay rights, welfare rights, and cultural revolution, Vagrant Nation provides insight relevant to this battle, as well as the battle over the legacy of the 1960s' transformations themselves.

States of Dependency


Karen M. Tani - 2016
    States of Dependency traces New Deal welfare programs over the span of four decades, asking what happened as money, expertise and ideas travelled from a federal administrative epicenter in Washington, DC, through state and local bureaucracies, and into diverse and divided communities. Drawing on a wealth of previously un-mined legal and archival sources, Karen Tani reveals how reformers attempted to build a more bureaucratic, centralized and uniform public welfare system; how traditions of localism, federalism and hostility toward the 'undeserving poor' affected their efforts; and how, along the way, more and more Americans came to speak of public income support in the powerful but limiting language of law and rights. The resulting account moves beyond attacking or defending Americans' reliance on the welfare state to explore the complex network of dependencies undergirding modern American governance.

Punished with Poverty: The Suffering South - Prosperity to Poverty & the Continuing Struggle


James Ronald Kennedy - 2016
    Punished with Poverty tells the unvarnished story of the intentional policy of economic devastation and exploitation of the South which has affected all Southerners, both black and white, long after the close of the “Civil War” and “Reconstruction.” In fact, the sad legacy of these punitive policies continues to this very day. The over-arching theme of Southern history is not Race, as is conventionally stated, but Poverty—poverty not due to the South’s shortcomings, but imposed on them by the system under which they live. Punished with Poverty is a timely and much needed contribution to the understanding of both the South and the nature of the “Federal Empire” under which all Americans now live. From Punished with Poverty “The South’s subjugation and impoverishment have fallen hard on both black and white citizens of the South. Our redemption will come only when all Southerners understand how and why we stand impoverished and virtually defenseless before an all-powerful big government.” (6) “The one great question in today’s political and cultural environment is simply this: ‘Will this generation of Americans have the “right stuff” like the generation of 1776.’ Simply stated, is liberty more important than government to modern Southerners and Americans? For Southerners their ‘subjugation’ and eventual impoverishment has fallen hard on both black and white citizens of the South. Our redemption will come only when Southerners understand how and why we stand impoverished and virtually defenseless before an all-powerful government. Prosperity follows liberty!” (12) “Only 33 years after the establishment of the new government under the Constitution, Southerners were already realizing the adverse consequence of being a minority segment of a government run by the Northern majority.” (148) “When Christians today decry the use of Federal power to enforce secular humanist views upon the nation, they should be reminded that it was Patrick Henry who warned Southerners what could and would happen in a democracy if one finds himself in the minority status.” (34) ***This title is enrolled in Kindle MatchBook. Free Kindle Edition with the purchase of the print edition on Amazon.com***

The Apostle Paul and the Christian Life: Ethical and Missional Implications of the New Perspective


Scot McKnight - 2016
    In this volume, world-renowned scholars explore the implications of the new perspective on Paul for the Christian life and church. James D. G. Dunn, N. T. Wright, Bruce Longenecker, Scot McKnight, and other leading New Testament scholars offer a response to this question: How does the apostle Paul understand the Christian life? The book makes a fresh contribution to the new perspective on Paul conversation and offers important new insights into the orientation of the Christian life.

From Welfare to Bestseller: A True Story


Rebecca Patrick-Howard - 2016
    The stigma of what she was about to do was already causing her embarrassment... ​ Rebecca Patrick-Howard and her family were living an enviable life: the All-American family living in one of the nicest houses in town, working good jobs, and enjoying their beautiful children. She was finally following her dream of becoming a writer and things had never looked better for the young family. She and her husband had no idea that a year later they'd be burying their youngest son. What followed was a nightmare. Suddenly, they found themselves struggling not only emotionally, but financially and physically.And, despite their best intentions and hard work, through a series of more unfortunate events that included job loss and illness, they found themselves in the one place nobody wants to be–the cold, unfriendly, metal chairs of the welfare office. Over the next few years they'd battle the shame, humiliation, and stigma of being in "the system", while still trying to deal with their individual grief, depression, and continuous financial setbacks. It's a situation many Americans find themselves in, and one that few want to talk about.  Then came the ghosts.  FROM WELFARE TO BESTSELLER chronicles the events that led Rebecca's family from the American dream to living on welfare and how, through a combination of hard work, ingenuity, and a little bit of luck, she became one of of the top-selling paranormal authors on Amazon. Through child loss, brain surgery, job losses, mental illness, and isolation Rebecca and her husband set lofty goals, determined to create a home-based business and use her books to pull themselves out of the hole they felt trapped in. When you've hit rock bottom, after all, the only way to go is up. In this extremely personal narrative that's part inspirational memoir, part self-help guidebook, Rebecca shares her story of how she fell to the bottom of the hole, what she did to finally reach the top, and the stumbling blocks she encountered along the way.

Dark Ghettos: Injustice, Dissent, and Reform


Tommie Shelby - 2016
    Scholars and commentators today often identify some factor--such as single motherhood, joblessness, or violent street crime--as the key to solving the problem and recommend policies accordingly. But, Tommie Shelby argues, these attempts to "fix" ghettos or "help" their poor inhabitants ignore fundamental questions of justice and fail to see the urban poor as moral agents responding to injustice.Drawing on liberal-egalitarian philosophy and informed by leading social science research, Dark Ghettos examines the thorny questions of political morality raised by ghettos. Should government foster integrated neighborhoods? If a "culture of poverty" exists, what interventions are justified? Should single parenthood be avoided or deterred? Is voluntary nonwork or crime an acceptable mode of dissent? How should a criminal justice system treat the oppressed? Shelby offers practical answers, framed in terms of what justice requires of both a government and its citizens, and he views the oppressed as allies in the fight for a society that warrants everyone's allegiance."The ghetto is not 'their' problem but ours, privileged and disadvantaged alike," Shelby writes. The existence of ghettos is evidence that our society is marred by structural injustices that demand immediate rectification. Dark Ghettos advances a social vision and political ethics that calls for putting the abolition of ghettos at the center of reform.

Empty Places


Kathy Cannon Wiechman - 2016
    Times are tough in the mining community, especially for thirteen-year-old Adabel Cutler’s family. As they fight to survive, Adabel has to figure out her own identity while dealing with her volatile father, her dutiful sister, her defiant brother, and her mother’s disappearance, which she can’t seem to remember. This is a beautifully written and deeply felt coming-of-age novel by the acclaimed author of Like a River. Includes an author’s note, bibliography, and archival images.

Reaching Out Messages of Hope


Mariah Kennedy - 2016
    All author royalties will be donated to UNICEF. Fifteen-year-old Mariah Kennedy is passionate about fighting for social justice. As the UNICEF Australia Young Ambassador, Mariah created REACHING OUT as a fundraising project and all author royalties will be donated to UNICEF. Heartfelt and inspiring, this book contains stories, poems and illustrations that have been donated by some of the most world's renowned and respected authors and illustrators, including Graeme Base, Jackie French, Michael Leunig, Bruce Whatley, Michael Morpurgo, Andy Griffiths, Anna Perera, Libby Gleeson, Melina Marchetta, Alison Lester, Morris Gleitzman and many more. Ages: 10-14

Claiming Her Dignity: Female Resistance in the Old Testament


L. Juliana M. Claassens - 2016
    In the darkest periods of human history, men and women have risen up and in many different voices said this one thing: “Do not treat me like this. Treat me like the human being that I am.” Claiming Her Dignity explores a number of stories from the Old Testament in which women in a variety of creative ways resist the violence of war, rape, heterarchy, and poverty. Amid the life-denying circumstances that seek to attack, violate, and destroy the bodies and psyches of women, men, and children, the women featured in this book absolutely refuse to succumb to the explicit, and at times subtle but no less harmful, manifestations of violence that they face.