Orphans of the Living: Stories of America's Children in Foster Care

This is a disturbing book, and anyone who cares will be deeply affected by it. Jennifer Toth is a gifted authour writing about a subject most seem to want to sweep under the rug. Until the difficult aspects of foster care are discussed so openly, changes will not take place. Under the hardships are children who desperately need help, which the current antiquated and bureaucratic system is not always able to provide. This book chronicles the hopes, dreams, successes and failures of some, but are reflective of many in the system.

There are few criminal enterprises more cloaked in secrecy than "child welfare" agencies and how the government raises orphans and other kids left to fend for themselves in foster care. Impressively, despite the best efforts of bureaucrats in several states, Jennifer Toth manages to tell the true stories of five unforgettable children in California, Chicago and North Carolina who try to survive the incredible obstacles placed in their way by the government agencies that are supposed to help them. Toth does a magnificent job in putting a face on foster care kids. They'll make you laugh and they'll make you cry, but how they are treated by social workers and the states will just make you angry. Highly recommended

As a social worker, youth counselor, foster parent and former DCFS foster care caseworker I was deeply touched with the honesty and integrity that Jennifer brings to her work. Rarely has an author been able to so accurately put the reader in the shoes of these wounded kids. While some may be turned off at the bleak hopelessness that many of these kids feel, if we are going to help and heal the youth of today's foster care system, we must first be willing to honestly address the reality of their world. Jennifer does this in a highly professional yet deeply loving way. I HIGHLY recommend this to all foster parents, foster care workers and youth counselors. But mostly, I recommend this to parents of at-risk and troubled youth. It will enlighten all into how the world looks through the eyes of these kids.

Jennifer Toth describes vibrantly the lives of five extraordinary children who were thrown away by their families and stuck in the nation's mess of a foster-care system. What these kids have to put up with is unreal -- crazy foster parents, judges and inept social workers keen on covering their butts. Toth does a great job of bringing these kids to life, from the day they were born until they reach adulthood. But she also does an important service in exposing the ridiculous obstacles that foster care puts in their way.

Unfortunately today, society is no longer surprised by the thought of child neglect or abuse. Such stories are found in the local and national news daily. However, Jennifer 's Orphans of the Living, demands that the issues of child neglect and foster care must not be merely labeled as 3old news.2 The author immerses the reader into the minds of four young people who have grown up within the realm of foster care. Their graphic and heart-piecing anecdotes, clearly relay Toth1s belief that substitute child care does not usually lead the child to happiness or normalcy. Through the stories of these kids, she instead depicts how the foster care system often concentrates more on reputation and politics than the well-being of the children. Toth provides not a more lucid image of the orphans' psychology, but also on juvenile criminality and violence. Her studies support that abused kids are reduced to thinking that violence will award them with the love and attention of their parents. This book will definitely cause you to view juvenile criminal offenders with new eyes. Orphan1s of the Living will indeed devour you with its gross and often unbearable rawness. However, as Troth has dutifully acknowledged, we owe it to these kids to hear their stories.