The author recalls her traumatic experiences as a victim of sexual abuse as a child and shares her thoughts of pain, confusion, and then forgiveness for her abuser through her personal diary.

Tony Johnson reveals how he grew up abused, made school and New York's mean streets a refuge, was rescued by people who could love him, and ultimately had to face an AIDS diagnosis.

Presents the story of Tina Zahn, a woman suffering from severe postpartum depression, who tried taking her life by jumping from the Leo Frigo Memorial Bridge in Green Bay, Wisconsin, but was miraculously saved by a state trooper.

Reluctantly giving up her California practice working with troubled children, Julia Cates is forced to draw on all her skills to deal with a young mute girl found abandoned and terrified in her Pacific Northwest hometown.

Teresa's summer vacation falls apart when five of her eight siblings board a Greyhound bus in California headed back to their home in Florida. At seven, Teresa is faced with homelessness and child abuse as she cares for her mentally unstable mother.

The memoir of Jaycee Dugard, who was kidnapped on June 10, 1991 from a school bus stop within sight of her home in Tahoe, California, when she was 11 years old. She was held prisoner by convicted sex offender Phillip Garrido and his wife, Nancy Garrido. She was held captive by the Garridos for over eighteen years, all the while living in a tent on the Garrido property. During her captivity she gave birth to two children fathered by Garrido. She reappeared...

"In this richly depicted story, told in vignettes relative to markers of age and experience, Patricia Eagle reveals the heartbreak and destruction of her sexual abuse, from age four to thirteen, by her father. A victim of her father's anger and her mother's complacency with his abusive behavior, Eagle uses dissociation and numbing in response to the abuse, and as a way to block her own sense of self. How does a child confused by episodes of abuse...

In 1987, obese, illiterate, black 16-year-old Claireece 'Precious' Jones lives in Harlem with her dysfunctional family. She has been raped and impregnated twice by her father, Carl. She suffers constant physical, mental and sexual abuse from her unemployed mother, Mary. After getting pregnant for the second time, Precious is suspended from her school. Her principal arranges to have her attend an alternative school where her new teacher, Ms. Rain,...