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Loading... Have You Found Her: A Memoirby Janice Erlbaum
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. This is one of the best books I have read in a while. I couldn't put it down. It's hard to believe it's all a very true story. Though it's ending is pretty bland, I can't say I didn't see it coming. You could see the enabling through out the book. BUT, that being said, there were so many twists and turns I didn't see coming. I kept wondering through out, though, why is she doing this? Why does she keep Sam in her life? I guess the title says it all, "Have you found her", maybe meaning, has she found herself? I don't know if I could have been as strong as Erlbaum. But the story was completely captivating none the less. the true story of a volunteer who works with a troubled runaway teen - who turns out to have more to her than meets the eye... What an incredible memoir! Janice volunteers at the homeless shelter she lived in 20 years prior. She is the Wednesday night 'bead lady" and is warned not to play favorites. There she meets a tough street kid, Samantha, who tells her her tragic life story and how she really wants to end her drug habit and make something of herself. Janice sees herself in this young woman: smart, determined, hard core. There begins this tale of deception. Amazingly written - you cannot put it down! Janice Erlbaum briefly lived in a homeless shelter when she was a teen and wanted to give back 20 years later. As the "bead lady" she brought craft projects to the residents but soon became attached - WAY too attached - to one girl in particular. Supporting Sam as she went from the shelter to hospitals and other facilities, Janice shared her ups and downs and found that all was not as it seemed. This reads like a novel, but life doesn't always wrap up loose ends neatly. 0.030 seconds to build listing no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0812974573, Paperback)And every week, there was the unspoken question, the one I didn’t know enough to ask myself : Have you found her yet? The one who reminds you of you?Twenty years after she lived at a homeless shelter for teens, Janice Erlbaum went back to volunteer. Now thirty-four years old and a successful writer, she’d changed her life for the better; now she wanted to help someone else–someone like the girl she’d once been. Then she met Sam. A brilliant nineteen-year-old junkie savant, the product of a horrifically abusive home, Sam had been surviving alone on the streets since she was twelve and was now struggling for sobriety against the adverse health effects of long-term drug abuse. Soon Janice found herself caring deeply for Sam, following her through detoxes and psych wards, halfway houses and hospitals, becoming ever more manically driven to save her from the sickness and sadness leftover from Sam’s terrible past. But just as Janice was on the verge of becoming the girl’s legal guardian, she made a shocking discovery: Sam was sicker than anyone knew, in ways nobody could have imagined. Written with startling candor and immediacy, Have You Found Her is the story of one woman’s quest to save a girl’s life–and the hard truths she learns about herself along the way. “A rich and compelling account . . . Ultimately this is a book about the narrator’s journey and the dangers that attend the urge within us all to believe we can save another soul. A terrific read.” –Cammie McGovern, author of Eye Contact (retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:04 -0400) The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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I enjoyed the book because the author seems to honestly relate the story without trying to explain or justify the entire experience. I think in writing the book Janice may have been trying to understand the events herself. Although the ending is a bit abrupt and you are left with many questions, this is not something the author can help. As a memoir, the book is intended to relate the story from the author's perspective. If she would have changed it to "make the ending interesting" it would have defeated the purpose of writing a memoir. (