Orphans of the Living: Stories of America’s Children in Foster Care
May 12, 2010 by Adoption Information and Laws
Filed under Adoption Products & Books
Product Description
For this eye-opening look at how America cares for its abused and neglected children, Toth traveled to foster-care homes, orphanages, and juvenile detention centers to record the poignant, often heroic voices of youngste… More >>
Orphans of the Living: Stories of America’s Children in Foster Care
A terrific book. Toth tells the gripping stories of children who would otherwise be forgotten and ignored by society. I couldn’t put down this book. And by the time I finished, I felt like I personally knew Angel, Bryan, Jamie and the rest of the children profiled
Rating: 5 / 5
I recommend this book to all who are interested in becoming Foster Care Providers or working with Foster Children. THese are all sad stories of how the richest country in the World treats their children. These same stories can be repeated over and over and over again. I am involved with the Foster Care System and I have to say it is sadly managed, poorly funded, and ineptly cared for.
Hopefully this author could do a similar book on how Foster Homes are disrupted, run-out, get burnt out, etc – all do to the same reasons.
Rating: 4 / 5
I enjoyed this book. I think it will give anyone who reads it an understanding of a different kind of success. Not necessarily a lowered standard of success, but a better definition of success. Success is rising above the what others had expected out of you.
I am thankful for the book, it gave me insight into some questions my husband and I had about older children adoption.
Rating: 5 / 5
Orphans of the Living starts out with a bang, but drags to an end. The initial story of the two orphanages in a small southern town educates the reader on the foster care system and children’s homes as they function today. It is much different than Annie or the Cider House Rules. I was riveted to the way different children reacted to being separated from their parents, and how they dealt with the typical sexual and physical abuse present in their lives. It even helped me understand the behaviour of certain disadvantaged children in my personal history. Unfortunately, much of it was all too familiar to me from children I knew growing up.
Perhaps it’s a liberal cliche, but it’s important to understand the criminal. Many of the foster children were involved in criminal behaviour, but much of the time, it was almost not of their own will. One child does not understand why it was wrong for him to rape another child, because it was the way that ‘love’ was shown to him in his formative years. Orphans of the Living covers this topic particularly well in the first section.
Orphans of the Living does a particularly good job of showing all types, a wide variety, of foster children. White or black, from good family or from none. Whatever your mental stereotype, it will be challenged. I also liked the way she did not specify race unless necessary, which allows us to escape our own biases as we read.
I only gave it 3 stars because it wasn’t as interesting as her previous book – The Mole People. Some chapters are inordinately long. Luckily, none of the sections rely on one another, so if one child’s story simply bores you, you can safely skip it and read the next. However, The Mole People was never boring, so I had to take some marks from Orphans of the Living. It also hasn’t become a topic of constant conversation like other books I’ve read lately. Still, I would recommend it to anyone interested in this area of study.
Rating: 3 / 5
I enjoyed this book but found that it did not neccesarily apply to my job as a soial worker. I work towards finding permanency for abused and neglected children and while the book is very thorough about the systems used in the various states, my state doesn’t work like this, so it was disconcerting at times. Overall, teh way the children interact with adults is very true and the problems facing our kids are the same.
Rating: 4 / 5