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Troubled
A Memoir of Foster Care, Family, and Social Class
Brief Description
Masterpiece Evening Standard Fascinating The Economist Best Titles of 2024 In this vivid coming-of-age memoir, Rob Henderson recounts growing up in foster care, enlisting in the US Air Force, attending elite universities - and what he learnt from seeing life from both sides of the tracks....
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Format: Paperback / softback
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Description
Masterpiece Evening Standard
Fascinating The Economist Best Titles of 2024
In this vivid coming-of-age memoir, Rob Henderson recounts growing up in foster care, enlisting in the US Air Force, attending elite universities - and what he learnt from seeing life from both sides of the tracks.
Rob Henderson was born to a drug-addicted mother and a father he never met, ultimately shuttling between ten different foster homes in California. When he was adopted into a loving family, he hoped that life would finally be stable and safe. He was wrong: tragedy, poverty and violence marked his adolescent years.
An unflinching portrait of shattered families, desperation, and determination, Troubled recounts how Henderson eventually managed to find an escape route through the military, which led to an academic career at Yale and Cambridge. As he reflects on the fate of many of his friends - drugs, death, prison - Henderson never escapes the feeling of being on the outside looking in, or a sense that his academic achievements are hollow compared to the love and protection that comes from stable family life. He dissects the hypocrisies of contemporary social class and shows how the most privileged among us benefit from a set of 'luxury beliefs' that actively harm the most vulnerable.
Rave Reader Reviews
Eye-opening and heart-breaking
Inspiring
Incredible
Wow
Powerful and thought-provoking
Book Details
INFORMATION
ISBN: 9781800753662
Publisher: Swift Press
Format: Paperback / softback
Date Published: 30 January 2025
Country: United Kingdom
Imprint: Forum
Audience: General / adult
DIMENSIONS
Width: 129.0mm
Height: 198.0mm
Weight: 250g
Pages: 290
About the Author
Rob Henderson grew up in foster homes in Los Angeles and the rural town of Red Bluff, California. He joined the Air Force at the age of seventeen. After his enlistment, he graduated from Yale University with a BS in psychology and was subsequently awarded a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. Once described as 'self-made' by the New York Times, Rob received a PhD in psychology from St. Catharine’s College, Cambridge in 2022. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, and the New York Post, among other outlets. Rob’s popular Substack newsletter is sent each week to more than forty thousand subscribers.
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