Book picks similar to
Two More Sleeps by Rosie Lewis


non-fiction
true-story
foster-care
short-stories

Mummy, Make It Stop


Louise Fox - 2009
    But the birth of her child saw Louise vow to turn her life around - and that is just what she did. 'Mummy, Make It Stop' is the true story of a brave spirit that refused to be crushed.

Can't Anyone Help Me?


Toni Maguire - 2011
    Can't Anyone Help Me? is the shocking true story by Toni Maguire.Jackie was an unwanted child. So unwanted that her mother regularly left Jackie at her uncle's house. Which was when the nightmare started. For when his wife went out, her uncle's friends came round. He had a Special Room. In it Jackie was tied up and molested, beaten, burnt by cigarettes and urinated on. Sometimes other children were brought along. Jackie got to know the Special Room intimately.Jackie could never bring herself to tell her mother. She ended up in a home for disturbed children. She ran away, and a life of homelessness, drugs, prostitution and psychiatric wards followed. Eventually, Jackie sought help. But could she turn her life around? Would her evil uncle and his Special Room haunt her forever?Can't Anyone Help Me? by Toni Maguire is the inspirational story of struggle and survival against all odds as one young woman attempts to put her torturous past behind her and make a future for herself.Toni Maguire is the author of four bestselling books: Don't Tell Mummy, When Daddy Comes Home, Nobody Came and Helpless.

Invisible Tears: The Abuse, The Rebellion, The Survival, Despite All Odds


Abigail Lawrence - 2010
    Still distraught, Abbie is passed to whoever will have her. Her new step mother subjects her to unimaginable physical, sexual and psychological torture and delivers her to local paedophiles in the entertainment business. During her single minded pursuit of fame Abbie’s step mother stops at nothing, beating and prostituting her own children.Abbie loses control and becomes well known to the local police. Not one person can get through to her because she has no fear, no self respect, no morals or self worth. With nothing to lose, she throws herself into one battle after another, blood and guts brawling between the skin heads and the mods on the streets of London.Her family eventually disowns her realizing they are unable to help. Abbie finds herself in the care of the Court until she is abandoned by children's homes and Social Services too. Alone, penniless and pregnant at the age of 16. Haunted by the secrets of her unspeakable past. Will anyone ever see her invisible tears?

The Privilege of Youth: A Teenager's Story


Dave Pelzer - 2004
    From A Child Called “It” to The Lost Boy, from A Man Named Dave to Help Yourself, Dave Pelzer’s inspirational books have helped countless others triumph over hardship and misfortune.  In The Privilege of Youth, he shares the missing chapter of his life: as a boy on the threshold of adulthood.  With sensitivity and insight, he recounts the relentless taunting he endured from bullies; but he also describes the thrill of making his first real friends—some of whom he still shares close relationships with today.  He writes about the simple pleasures of exploring his neighborhood, while trying to forget the hell waiting for him at home.From high school to a world beyond the four walls that were his prison for so many years, The Privilege of Youth bravely and compassionately charts this crucial turning point in Dave Pelzer’s life and will inspire a whole new generation of readers.

Learning to Love Amy: The foster carer who saved a mother and a daughter (HarperTrue Life - A Short Read)


Mia Marconi - 2014
    She came to foster carer Mia Marconi’s house when she was three; she’d already been in care for five months by then. But her mum Amy didn’t get on with her carer and threatened to kill her so India was moved.But no matter how inadequate parents are, children in care love them and want the world to love them too.Amy had had a hard life: she was one of seven siblings, all of who had been abused and ended up in care. She was an alcoholic and she phoned all times of day and night threatening suicide.When India finally settled in Mia’s happy household, Mia embarked on amazing journey to help Amy too.

Please Don't Make Me Go


John Fenton - 2008
    When, aged 13, his father brought a charge against him in order to remove him from the family home, John found himself in Juvenile Court – from here he was sent to the notorious St. Vincent’s school, run by a group of Catholic Irish Brothers.Beatings and abuse were a part of daily life – both from John’s fellow pupils, but also from the brothers, all of which was overseen by the sadistic headmaster, Brother De Montfort. Tormented physically and sexually by one boy in particular, and by the Brothers in general, John quickly learnt to survive but at the cost of the loss of his childhood.Please don’t make me go, tells in heart-rending detail the day-to-day lives of John and the other boys – the beatings, the weapons fashioned from toilet chains and stones, the loneliness – but we also see the development of John’s love of reading, his growing friendship with Father Delaney and his best friend, Bernard, and his unstinting love for his mother whom he feared was suffering at the hands of his violent father.A painfully, brutally honest account, Please don’t make me go is also an example of the resilience of the human spirit as it documents how John learnt to survive and come through his ordeal.

The Lost Children


Mary MacCracken - 1974
    On the outside most of the children looked healthy. But the reality was far sadder. Locked away from love and any human contact, these children struggled with life every day.It soon became evident that Mary MacCracken was a natural, gifted teacher. Using her instincts, observations and common sense, Mary was able to establish a rapport with even the most difficult children. Over time, Mary taught her class to eat and to drink; she decoded their mutterings, and taught them to talk and to read. But most important of all she helped them to take the first steps towards feeling love and trust.There are no miracle-workers in this story, only a remarkable woman who refused to give up. Heartfelt, moving and incredibly inspiring, this is an amazing story about the astonishing human capacity for growth and change, even in those whom society regards as beyond help.

Scrag - Up the Hill Backwards


Jesamine James - 2013
    This is my story of how a paedophile entered my life, home and family when I was six years old.I highlight how he attempted to break my mind, soul and spirit for his total control over me, and how I fought for my sanity, survival and freedom against his evil and constant onslaught of abuse.I was Marie; now I'm Jes.“Even when I die, I'll come back to haunt you.”It's time for Jes to bury Marie's ghosts forever.Six-year-old Marie finds her world has changed and become one of confusion, deceit and abuse.No longer called by her birth name, she is unaffectionately referred to as Scrag - a shortened version of Scraggy-knickered-nut-rag.Her will to survive manifests quite bizarre tactics, as she deviates off course into a childhood of insanity, paranoia, glue-sniffing, self-harming and messages from David Bowie ringing through her ears.Her mind contrives strategies to cope with the continued onslaught that it seems destined to endure.Adulthood is her escape route if she can survive the wait, but can demons be truly locked away in the past forever?This is the story of one child's mind at the mercy of a real life monster.

Kidnapping My Daughter


Rachel Jensby - 2013
    Kidnapping My Daughter is the true account of a mother who spent more than two years on the run, first from local and state authorities only, and then eventually from the FBI as well. As more and more children are faced with court-licensed abuse every day, Rachel Jensby hopes to be a voice among many; joining other mothers who are effecting change by finally finding the courage to come forward with their stories.Kidnapping My Daughter is an account of events leading up to, and all that transpired during, this family's life on the run.A second volume, titled Bringing Cheyenne Home, tells the story of what happened afterward - starting with the family's first day back in court and goes on to detail the tumultuous years afterward, including a peek into Cheyenne's life today. Bringing Cheyenne Home will be available soon on Amazon for Kindle.

KERI: the SHOCKING true story of a child abused


Kat Ward - 2011
    Two loving parents, a backdrop of 1960’s Britain; life had provided for her, at least with the riches of modesty.Keri herself however, would often confound teachers with her erratic behaviour, which was at best sullen and withdrawn; at worst violently disruptive. When challenged, she would only exacerbate her growing reputation as a fantasist; weaving terrible tales about the “abuse” she was suffering at the hands of her very creators.But it was the much-celebrated age of innocence; the childhood of our modern culture. Big brother had not yet been born and Nanny was only looking out for her dearest, as opposed to the entire State. Who would take the word of child on such matters? After all, she was just a bad egg… wasn’t she?Well, no. She wasn’t. She was indeed, for over a decade, the victim of an abuse so staggering that merely to read about it is enough to freeze even the thickest of blood. “Keri” is the story of what happens when truth is imprisoned in a little glass jar and buried deep within the Earth, condemned to a sentence of eternal silence. For truth may be repressed, but never supressed. It will always find light eventually. And, in this gut-wrenching account of her early life, author Kat Ward takes the reader through every shade of darkness, whilst never allowing the candle of hope to fully extinguish, so as that truth may indeed find its rightful freedom.

Nobody Came: The Appalling True Story of Brothers Cruelly Abused in a Jersey Care Home


Robbie Garner - 2009
    'Nobody Came' is a harrowing account by one of the survivors of the Haut de la Garenne children's home in Jersey.

Somebody Else's Kids


Torey L. Hayden - 1981
    . . "A small seven-year-old boy who couldn't speak except to repeat weather forecasts and other people's words . . . A beautiful little girl of seven who had been brain damaged by terrible parental beatings and was so ashamed because she couldn't learn to read . . . A violently angry ten-year-old who had seen his stepmother murder his father and had been sent from one foster home to another . . . A shy twelve-year-old from a Catholic school which put her out when she became pregnant . . ."What do we matter?""Why do you care?"They were four problem children-put in Torey Hayden's class because no one else knew what to do with them. Together, with the help of a remarkable teacher who cared too much to ever give up, they became almost a family, able to give each other the love and understanding they had found nowhere else.

What Daddy Did: The Shocking True Story of a Little Girl Betrayed


Donna Ford - 2008
    Between the ages of five and 11, Donna was physically, mentally, and sexually abused. She was starved, beaten, and "loaned out" to neighbors who raped and molested her. When her stepmother finally left the family home, Donna dreamed of a normal childhood in which she would be taken care of by her father who had, up until this point, failed her. But it was not to be. In telling the whole story of her childhood, Donna tries to understand why the man who should have loved her was the one who deceived her the most by continuing to allow men to abuse her. Instead of finding a future of love and happiness, Donna was once again thrust into a living nightmare of exploitation and betrayal by those who should have wrapped her up in their love. Donna also tells of her efforts to find her own mother—who abandoned her when she was young— and of the terrors she has gone through as an adult. While this is a story of the appalling physical, mental, and emotional abuse, it is also a tale of how exhilaration, tenderness, and self-development can flourish despite childhood horrors.

No One Wants You: A True Story of a Child Forced into Prostitution


Celine Roberts - 2006
    Illegitimate and unwanted, Celine was forced by her foster mother into prostitution. Her bones were broken, her nose was crushed and she ate candle wax to stay alive.Celine was finally rescued and sent to an industrial school, where she picked up the pieces of her shattered life. She also began the search for her parents. But what she found gave her battered survival instincts the hardest knock of all...

Dirty Old Man (A True Story)


Moll French - 2013
    I knew one called Bernie.He groomed me and led me away from home." It's been all over the news lately. Teenagers running away from home. Groomed and snatched from the nest by predators, before they get chance to spread their wings.Regardless of culture or social class, it's happening everywhere; online, in schools, clubs and societies.It happened to me, Moll.This is my true story, a harrowing account of my stolen youth, and my journey to take it back. A story of the ones who overlooked my situation, and a story dedicated to those who made a difference to my life.I lived in that squalid mobile home for two and a half years with my abuser. I even married him because I felt I had no way out. From the mind games of my father, to the open arms of Bernie, I was stuck between a rock and a hard place.I was helpless for a short time, but never hopeless.