Orphans of the Living: Stories of America’s Children in Foster Care
Jennifer Toth
Reader, beware: Jennifer Toth’s Orphans of the Living is not a happy book. In fact, it would be difficult to find a more depressing subject than the current state of foster care in the United States. Nevertheless, in an age plagued by drastic governmental cut-backs on social programs — a time in which women and children are by far the most numerous victims of poverty — the fate of foster children is an important, if painful, subject. Toth’s report from the frontlines of what is known as "substitute care" is not encouraging; as she follows the lives of five young people as they move through the system—from Damien, a rape victim at age 8 who becomes a sexual predator by age 13, to Bryan, who struggles to benefit from one of the country’s best foster programs — Toth’s subjects are as heartbreaking as their success is improbable. Toth has wisely put a human face on the child welfare system’s carnage.
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