Dave Pelzer was brutally beaten & starved by his emotionally unstable alcoholic mother a mother who played tortuous unpredictable games
- games that left one of her three sons nearly dead. She no longer considered Dave a son but a slave; no longer a boy but an 'it'. His bed was an old army cot in the basement his clothes were torn & smelly & when he was allowed the luxury of food it was scraps from the dog's bowl. The outside world knew nothing of the nightmare played out behind closed doors. But throughout Dave kept alive dreams of finding a family to love him. This book covers the early years of his life & is an affecting & inspirational book of the horrors of child abuse & the steadfast determination of one child to survive.