Description

There are millions of homeless children in America today and in A Place Called Home awardwinning child welfare advocate David Ambroz writes about growing up homeless in New York for eleven years and his subsequent years in foster care offering a window into what so many kids living in poverty experience every day

When David and his siblings should be in elementary school they are instead walking the streets seeking shelter while their mother is battling mental illness They rest in train stations 24hour diners anywhere thats warm and dry they bathe in public restrooms and steal food to quell their hunger When David is placed in foster care at first it feels like salvation but soon proves to be just as unsafe Hes moved from home to home and in all but one placement hes abused His burgeoning homosexuality makes him an easy target for others cruelty

David finds hope and opportunities in libraries schools and the occasional kindhearted adult he harnesses an inner grit to escape the alltoofamiliar outcome for a kid like him Through hard work and unwavering resolve he is able to get a scholarship to Vassar College his first significant step out of poverty He later graduates from UCLA Law with a vision of using his degree to change the laws that affect children in poverty

Told with lyricism and sparkling with warmth A Place Called Home depicts childhood poverty and homelessness as it is experienced by so many young people who have been systematically overlooked and unprotected Its at once a gripping personal account of deprivationhow one boy survived it and ultimately thrivedand a resounding call for readers to move from empathy to action