A Prisoner's Fight: The Pandemic As Seen From Inside the Illinois Department of Corrections, Paperback

This book begins from the early 1970s. It tells the story of a boy (the Author) in first person. The author has one brother, one sister, a mother and a very ill father. Throughout the book, the family bounces around the country until the father dies. The family experiences homelessness. The mother remarries and is terribly abused, as are all the children, who are taken away by the State of Louisiana. The author relates the irony of the foster care system, at times being as bad as the abuse was, and talks about other street kids and the insane things he used to do just to feel alive. Each chapter ends with reflection, and the whole book is written in the author's sarcastic and (dare I say) witty style to add humor to a desperate situation.

A lot of people think they know what Foster Care is. They have no idea.