Hindsight: Coming of Age on the Street of Hollywood by Sheryl Recinos presents a childhood fraught with family dysfunction caused by mental illness and emotional and psychological abuse. The two formative figures in Recinos’ life were negligible participants instead of the supportive, loving parents all children need to grow and thrive into adulthood.
While this memoir takes place in the 1980s and 90s, we can only hope the services that support runaways and dysfunction within families have improved. For example, her father’s main go-to plan for dealing with his daughter was to commit her to an asylum instead of doing the hard work of parenting.
Homelessness, a significant theme in this memoir, is continuously in the news, an issue that plagues every major city in America and occurs even in small towns and rural settings. Homelessness is one of those issues that many in America turn a blind eye to and ignore, but Recinos shines a light, bright and clear, on this issue, and knowing her story helps us understand this issue in a new way. It brings a face to embody homelessness and a possible answer to the question, why?
Why do people choose the street? Why do people refuse shelter? Why do some kids become flight risks? The answers may surprise you.
Recinos never places blame, of which there seems plenty to go around. Never blames her mentally ill mother, who, during a psychotic episode, put her and her brother in danger. She never blames her father and portrays him as a figure that we can sympathize with at times. She never blames the legal system that failed her time and again, penalizing her but never breaking her spirit. And she never condemns any of the men that rape or attack her. She doesn’t blame drugs or alcohol or any “friends” she meets along the way who rob her or worsen her situation.
Instead, Recinos tells the story of her teen-years with a pragmatic focus on the events. She never imposes her adult understanding of this world but focuses on her mental state at the time. What she produces is a raw and unapologetic story of a girl misunderstood, trying to survive in a world of neglect and abuse.
That she survives is a miracle. That she finds her way out of homelessness to become a successful contributing member of society, becoming a loving parent with no role model for such a thing is another.
Recinos breaks the cycle of abuse that drove her to the streets. She has become a champion of homeless teens. Her ability to see the injury she suffered through an unfiltered lens, and not accept it or be shaped by it, is why we love Dr. Recinos and her story.
This memoir is a page-turner, a tour de force, a blockbuster read that will have you laughing, crying, cringing, and hoping for something better for this young woman. You won’t be disappointed. Recinos delivers, and she does so with grace and talent. We highly recommend this intense and eye-opening memoir.
Venice has a long and intricate history and is best known as “The Floating City.” Tourists from across the world come to marvel at its beautiful architecture and walk over its countless bridges. Getting lost in time among the splendors of Venice can be seductive. Visitors will recognize the undercurrent of romance and mystery to the city, and make no mistake, Christine Evelyn Volker captures it in her novel, Venetian Blood: Murder in a Sensuous City.
Twenty-two-year-old museum intern and unknown artist, Anne Gautier, has undertaken a significant project, restoring an elegant house on one of the most beautiful streets in New Orleans. The grand old Creole home has been in her family for many generations, and, when her grandfather died, he left her the house on Esplanade Avenue, where all the best French Creole families once lived.
Charlie Suisman’s debut novel is a wonderful escape to a small fictional community in upstate New York. Here a melting pot of quirky residents brings Arnold Falls to life, a town with a unique history and charming inhabitants whose lives are intimately intertwined.
Politics is a deadly game in the days of Kings and their competing 14th-century B.C. Egyptian factions. Official diplomat, Lord Hani, is on a royal assignment when he discovers even the king’s motives are suspect. Hani begins to fear for the welfare of his family and himself, as he gets a sinking feeling that the hunter has become the hunted. He’s the live bait, the Bird In A Snare.
Self-respect and determination provide the themes for this cheerful children’s book by English author Sylva Fae.
During World War II “quisling” became a byword for a particular type of traitor, one who not only betrays their own country but also actively collaborates with the invaders. The origin of the term was taken from an actual person, a Norwegian named Vidkun Quisling, who didn’t merely cooperate with the Nazis but actually headed a collaborationist regime in his own country.
It’s as if a large chunk of her heart was wrenched away in an instant. Celia’s twin sister died suddenly in a terrible accident. Now Celia is haunted by this dear sister who is gone forever. Moreover, the emotional distance between herself and her parents, the only family that’s left behind, is painful. From her hell on earth, she yearns for her own, Celia’s Heaven, where all could be right again. But the road to Heaven is paved with broken promises and a shattering revelation.
There’s a lot about life on earth that we take for granted. Most of us go about our daily lives, but what would happen if the sun shot out a gigantic solar flare. Would we survive? What would happen to us?