Overview

An empowering memoir of resilience and redemption, and the rage that helped a girl escape the darkness of a harrowing childhood. Born to a violently dysfunctional home in working-class Denmark, Lisbeth Zornig Andersen and her three older brothers were bounced between foster care and state-run institutions, then back again to their chemically dependent mother and sadistic stepfather. For Lisbeth, it was a childhood without perimeters. It was blighted by poverty, sexual abuse, neglect, betrayal, and further victimization by the broken Danish social services system that forced Lisbeth to live where and how it saw fit. Coming of age with a myriad of fears and emotional disorders, Lisbeth had three things that would become driving forces in her life: she was extraordinarily bright, extremely willful, and exceptionally angry. From hell to liberation, this is Lisbeth’s emotional and galvanizing memoir told in two voices: that of a young girl who was unwanted, challenged, and defiant, and that of a woman who channeled her rage into a positive force as a passionate advocate for children’s rights. Whatever darkness defines the past, it can be used to change the future. Lisbeth’s heart-wrenching and ultimately uplifting journey is proof.

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9781542015905

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Reviews

“A courageous chronicle of abuse and redemption…Andersen writes with striking clarity…[her] candor about the trusted adults who repeatedly violated her illuminates painful yet vital insights about how to recognize and address the sometimes-contradictory and often undermining effects of childhood trauma. As she chronicles how she overcame years of extreme abuse to eventually thrive, Andersen’s revelations of intimate betrayals are often chilling, and many readers may be shocked or outraged. They should continue to read, however, because the book advances an important broader purpose: undergirding the value of survivors’ voices as instrumental to guiding future policies, advocacy, and change…Her history of trauma shaped her lifelong passion for protecting vulnerable populations, and this tightly distilled collection of memories serves as an urgent call to public action and reform with regard to children’s rights. This is a triumphant, empowering book that calls into question current patterns of intervention and challenges popular conceptions about what it means to believe young girls…A potent memoir of fragility and transcendence.” —Kirkus Reviews “This inspiring story of overcoming unimaginable adversity will be welcomed by a wide range of readers.” —Library Journal

A courageous chronicle of abuse and redemption...Andersen writes with striking clarity...[her] candor about the trusted adults who repeatedly violated her illuminates painful yet vital insights about how to recognize and address the sometimes-contradictory and often undermining effects of childhood trauma. As she chronicles how she overcame years of extreme abuse to eventually thrive, Andersen's revelations of intimate betrayals are often chilling, and many readers may be shocked or outraged. They should continue to read, however, because the book advances an important broader purpose: undergirding the value of survivors' voices as instrumental to guiding future policies, advocacy, and change...Her history of trauma shaped her lifelong passion for protecting vulnerable populations, and this tightly distilled collection of memories serves as an urgent call to public action and reform with regard to children's rights. This is a triumphant, empowering book that calls into question current patterns of intervention and challenges popular conceptions about what it means to believe young girls...A potent memoir of fragility and transcendence. -Kirkus Reviews This inspiring story of overcoming unimaginable adversity will be welcomed by a wide range of readers. -Library Journal

Author Information

Lisbeth Zornig Andersen is a former children’s ombudsman in Denmark and the author of the bestselling memoir Anger Is My Middle Name, her first work to be translated into English. Already well known in Denmark for her advocacy and for My Childhood in Hell, a documentary detailing her early years, Lisbeth received global recognition in 2015 when she was charged and later sentenced for picking up a family of Syrian refugees in her car. This simple act of charity earned coverage in such publications as the Washington Post, Le Monde, the Guardian, and the Huffington Post and on air at the BBC and Al Jazeera, igniting an international debate about the ethics and legality of humanitarian aid. Lisbeth has also founded her own advisory consultancy and charitable foundation, where she continues her socially centered work.

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