I had this in my "to read" queue for a while. Available at the library, it was also included in AudiblePlus, so it was there in my library. As I've been trying to add more none-fiction, I moved to this as I needed a new book. Of course it's a sad story of abuse. It was short and I finished it quickly. I had some issues with it. 

It starts with "The Rescue" ... so basically at the end, as David is removed from the home, and is now "free". Then the next chapter goes back to the beginning, when things were normal, and slowly slipped into the abuse. Then there are several chapters outlining severe abuse, and then an odd ending. I'm guessing that then the first chapter "The Rescue" happened shortly after the 7th chapter? The next day, the next week, the next month? This felt so odd and disconnected to me. 

The first chapter "The Rescue" and the Epilogue are both in present tense (and in italics in the text version). An adult David recounts some things ... and then there is "Perspectives on Child Abuse" by the author, and a note from a teacher, a social worker and executive director of the California Consortium for the Prevention of Child Abuse.

I could see there were a couple follow up books, and I debated continuing on, although with the epilogue, I felt this story had been told and finished. I wasn't sure if I wanted to dip back into sadness ... he is free, he's saved ... but of course I'm sure the next book will still outline many hardships in the foster care system. That the final "adult" chapter would again address struggles (twice divorced, controversy around his book/memories). I think I preferred just stopping with the little message of hope at the end of this book ... I feel like the continued books negate that.

In the notes afterward, the author states "The story has two objectives: the first is to inform the reader how a loving, caring parent can change to a cold, abusive monster venting frustrations on a helpless child; the second is the eventual survival and triumph of the human spirit over seemingly insurmountable odds" ... the latter seems to be addressed in many of the holocaust survivor memoirs, and I don't know that the first really happened. Did we ever learn WHY the mother did this, what was behind it? I feel like some other "misery memoirs" address things a little more ... [book:If You Tell: A True Story of Murder, Family Secrets, and the Unbreakable Bond of Sisterhood|45299992] also has a mother who does unspeakable things, but there, we see her history, as a troubled child (just "born bad"?), we understand a little more why the girls in that situation didn't run away or tell. In [book:Spilled Milk|18858489] it really tries to get into the mind of the abused child, and explain more the WHY they don't seek out help. Here, I felt that was missing. It was implied ... she made him think he was bad, that he deserved it, that he hated himself ... but then there were times being told when he didn't seem to feel that way. I just wanted to know why he didn't tell, didn't run away. This SAYS it's written in a child's voice (ages 4-12) but it didn't seem at all like a child's writing. It was definitely an adult remembrance ... I wanted more facts, what the California courts wrote in their record, what action was (if any?) was taken against the mother and father (sounds like the brothers were left in her care, that nothing really happened to her except that David was taken away).  I know it was a different time, but it's still hard to comprehend that this could have happened as bad as it was.

This book definitely made me think, made me grateful that anything like this is completely foreign to me ... and on those days where one thinks their role as a mom isn't as stellar as everyone else on social media, well, I guess I'm not so bad ;) 

I really don't care for this cover (I like the alternate ones for the trilogy much better). I hate the little "hand of God" on the four-year-old's face ... God references in the book ... "During all the years when I had prayed to God, he answered me only once ... I asked him to make mother sick ..." "I knew that if God had wanted Mother and Father to be happy, then I would have to be dead." "I hated God more than anything else in this or any other world."  "I began to give up on God, I felt like he must have hated me. What other reason could there be for a life like min?" and "there was no God. No God would leave me like this" "God had completely taken away my greatest hope. Inside I cursed His name, wishing I had never been born" ...and okay, it ends with him saying a prayer "deliver me from evil, Amen" but still, it wasn't God