Showing results for "True Stories" in Dysfunctional Families

Gaia was groomed, abused and enslaved – but then she fought back Gaia Cooper is just 14 years old when she is groomed by a criminal gang and forced to commit organised credit card fraud. Despite being placed in care – somewhere Gaia should feel safe – she is left even more vulnerable, and...

Growing up, Joanne suffered at the hands of a violent boyfriend and controlling relatives, as her mother lapsed into a downward spiral following the break-up of her marriage. But the consequences of her mother's lifestyle turned out to be worse than Joanne could ever have imagined. She already knew about the baby buried in a shallow makeshift grave next to the family plot. But when Joanne came across a red plastic bin in her mother's wardrobe in 2009, she realised that the family home held an even more sinister secret.

Growing up on the Navajo Indian Reservation, David Crow and his siblings idolized their dad. Tall, strong, smart, and brave, the self-taught Cherokee regaled his family with stories of his World War II feats. But as time passed, David discovered the other side of Thurston Crow, the ex-con with his own code of ethics that justified cruelty, violence, lies - even murder. A shrewd con artist with a genius IQ, Thurston intimidated David with beatings to coerce him into doing his criminal bidding. David's mom, too mentally ill to care for her children, couldn't protect him.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER Read the shocking true story now featured in the Netflix documentary My Father, The BTK Killer. What is it like to learn that your ordinary, loving father is a serial killer? Discover the true story behind the BTK killer, as told by those closest to him. In 2005, Kerri...

‘Each time my mother laid a finger on me… it was another step into the jaws of hell. Her abuse, more so than any other, destroyed me. It was the ultimate betrayal.’ Abused from the age of eight by her older brother and then her step-father, Maureen Wood quickly became numb to the constant...

From an award-winning journalist, this "grippingly suspenseful true-crime tale details the foiling of a wealthy Texan's plot to have his wife murdered" (Publishers Weekly). To the world, Linda DeSilva's marriage to Robert Edelman was perfect. He was her college boyfriend turned wealthy and...

One cold November night, in Cheyenne, Wyoming, fifteen-year-old Richard Jahnke Jr., ROTC leader and former Boy Scout, waited for his parents to return from celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the night they met. When his father got out of the car, the boy blasted him through the heart with a twelve-gauge pump-action shotgun. Richard's seventeen-year-old sister, Deborah, was sitting on the living room couch with a high-powered rifle - just in case her brother missed.

Frances Reilly and her sisters were abandoned by their mother outside Nazareth House Convent - a Belfast orphanage run by nuns. Little did they know the unimaginable cruelty they'd endure within its walls. Frances suffered horrifically at the hands of the Sisters: brutally beaten, worked like a slave, abused and molested, the convent regime stripped her of everything - education, innocence and childhood. But the hope of rescue or escape never left her. Years later, Frances would face her demons in court, bringing to account those who so viciously stole her youth. 

Innocent is the shocking true story of little Molly and Kit, siblings, aged 3 years and 18 months, who are brought into care as an emergency after suffering non-accidental injuries. Aneta and Filip, the children’s parents, are distraught when their children are taken into care. Aneta maintains...

Ryan and Phil had always been inseparable. Twins born 35 minutes apart, Ryan was the protective one, constantly looking out for his younger brother. They can't remember how old they were when the abuse started, but they can remember their uncle very clearly. A frequent visitor to their home in Lincoln, he lavished their family with expensive treats. School holidays and weekends were spent visiting him, when he would often take the two little boys aside to play the games he liked. Trapped with him, day after day, year after year, the abuse continued until Ryan and Phil turned 16.

Tilly hates her stepfather, Dave. He abuses her mother, but she refuses to leave him. Frightened for her own safety, Tilly asks to go into foster care and is placed with Cathy. Tilly arrives with a graze on her cheek and Cathy becomes increasingly concerned by Dave’s behaviour, especially when...

The true story of a 6-year-old boy with a dreadful secret. Oskar’s school teacher raises the alarm. Oskar’s mother is abroad and he has been left in the care of ‘friends’, but has been arriving in school hungry, unkempt, and with bruises on his arms, legs and body. Experienced foster...

The heartbreaking, iconic true story of an abandoned little boy’s horrific journey through the American foster care system. On a misty evening in Brooklyn, Jennings Michael Burch’s mother, too sick to care for him, left her eight-year-old son at an orphanage with the words, “I’ll be...

When a fancy car pulls up outside six-year-old Marie's home in 1959, her dad tells her she is going on holiday. But little does she know she will not see her home again for four long years. Her family cannot afford to keep her at home. Marie tells the story of how she was taken away from a poor but happy and loving home life to live in a convent - away from everyone and everything she holds dear. Her hair is bluntly chopped, her clothes are taken away and her name is changed. Then a horrific ritual of physical, sexual and mental abuse begins.

Bob Rowe and his wife Mary worked hard to build their American dream. A suburban home, barbecues in the summer, and a fast track corporate job made their life look ideal to outsiders. Yet they faced one of the most difficult challenges for a couple: their son Christopher was born severely handicapped and disabled. As a family, they managed to navigate through the tough times by being hands-on parents. Their efforts were emboldened by a group of extraordinary women - all of whom also had disabled children.

Based on a true story, The Forgotten Child is a heart-breaking memoir of an abandoned newborn baby left to die, his tempestuous upbringing, and how he came through the other side. It’s a freezing winter’s night in 1954. A baby boy, a few hours old, is left by his mother, wrapped in nothing...

In the much-anticipated follow-up to Sunday Times bestseller Trapped, foster carer Rosie Lewis tells the heartbreaking true story of Zadie. When the young teenage girl, thrown out of her home by her strict Muslim family, is discovered hiding on the city streets by the police, it is clear that...

Can I Let You Go? is the true story of Faye, a wonderful young woman who may never be able to parent her unborn child. Faye is 24, pregnant, and has learning difficulties as a result of her mother’s alcoholism. Faye is gentle, childlike and vulnerable, and normally lives with her grandparents...

‘There will be an avalanche of books about the pandemic. None will be as eye-opening or humane or moving as Lamb’s’ DAILY TELEGRAPH A story of poverty, generosity and worlds colliding in modern Britain When Covid-19 hit the UK and lockdown was declared, Mike Matthews wondered how his...

The No. 1 Sunday Times Bestseller. At just eight years old, Jodie is violent, aggressive and extremely challenging. Five carers in four months have been unable to cope, but there is one last hope: Cathy Glass… As Jodie begins to trust Cathy and make progress, shocking details about her past...