Author: Richard Pelzer
Completed:
A Brother's Journey: 10/19/09
A Teenager's Journey: 10/23/09
These books are memoirs by a man who, as a child, experienced one of the most horrible cases of child abuse in history. Possibly the only person exposed to worse abuse at the hand of a parent was Mr. Pelzer's older brother, Dave.
Dave, Richard's brother, had previously written about his story in a series of memoirs of his own. When Richard was young, Dave was taken away by child services. Their mother, in both cases, chose to single out an individual sibling and pit all of the others against the one. With Dave gone, Mrs. Pelzer chose Richard as her next victim.
The two books cover his life from prior to his brother leaving to his young adulthood. We got views of his abuse, and also the abuse he inflicted on himself. We got to see his life spiral out of control at the hands of a sadistic and ill mother, then continue at his own hands.
I had read Dave Pelzer's series of memoirs several years ago. So when I heard about these, and the fact that Richard essentially took over Dave's position in the family, I knew I had to read them. These books were good, and fairly quick reads. The story was compelling and shocking, much like that of his brother. The only real down side is that you can't really read these books without having read his brother's. He refers back to them several times, and also mentions throughout the story that he was too young to fully understand what went on while his brother was still living there but knows now from the books.
10 words or less: Read his brother's books, then read these.
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