Trafficked Girl, Zoe Patterson

   I don't know what I was expecting when I picked up this book. You can buy it on Amazon.com. The book is not very professional. It reads like an amateur wrote it. Maybe someone reading what I just wrote might jump to the conclusion that I'm putting it down or degrading it somehow. Maybe in most cases if I said the same words that would an accurate assessment. But this is the exception to the rule. The somewhat disorganized method of narration of inter-lapping flashbacks gives it an authentic weight that would be absent in a more professionally polished narration.
   I had no problem with reading this book. I never thought at any point that it was boring or had any significant problems with grammar or spelling which often goes hand-in-hand with amateurish books.
   This is the true story of a horribly abused girl. Sexually abused by her grandfather. Beaten, mentally abused, isolated from her family by her mother, she tries to escape. But when social services finally decides to act on her behalf, they make her life much worse.
   Zoe is put into a group home where she is targeted by two young women in their teens for sexual exploitation. They bully and force her into selling her body to men for sex. She never consents to any of this. Nor does she receive money for any of it. Alcohol becomes her escape.
   As she gets older, she is given welfare support, but she has no idea how to take care of herself. Instead of using her welfare payments for things like heating and other necessities, she uses all of it to buy alcohol.
   Eventually there is a light at the end of this tunnel. She makes a good friend who becomes her first true friend. She finds an attorney who helps Zoe get compensation for their terrible negligence. The book ends in an optimistic note. Maybe she'll live happily ever after. But of course that's not really how life works.
   My sister and I both went through the foster care system. It's safer to say that my sister's experience is closer to that of Zoe's than my own. When I was very young, I also asked adults for help to escape from my mother. An aunt who told me about it said that I screamed and cried after I had stayed with her for awhile, at the point when she tried to give me back. I would have been five. My mother exposed us to sexual and physical abuse. She and my older sister both subjected me to sexual abuse and bondage. My sister was exploited by my mother's frequently changed boyfriends. My mother was hooked on hard drugs.
  I had been told by my mother all the bad things about foster care. So, when all those bad things she talked about happened to me, I figured that they were normal. I only once had some sexual issues. But there was some violence. I was exploited for hard and heavy farm labor and never compensated for my time. So, I do have a personal inkling as to how awful government care can be. But in no way am I trying to say that that was as bad as being raped all the time.
   I do know what it's like to be constantly told that I cannot do anything with my life. Well, piss on all those people. I got my degree. Now I teach English at a middle sized university. What are those people doing? Some of them are probably dead. Others are probably still stuck in their trailers. Now who's laughing?