A Child Called 'It'

David J. Pelzer's mother, Catherine Roerva, was, he writes in this ghastly, fascinating memoir, a devoted den mother to the Cub Scouts in her care but not to David, her son, whom she referred to as "an It". This book is a brief, horrifying account of the bizarre tortures she inflicted on him, told from the point of view of the author as a young boy being starved, stabbed, smashed face-first into mirrors, forced to eat the contents of his sibling's diapers and a spoonful of ammonia, and burned over a gas stove by a maniacal, alcoholic mom. Sometimes she claimed he had violated some rule--no walking on the grass at school--but mostly it was pure sadism. Inexplicably, his father didn't protect him; only an alert schoolteacher saved David. One wants to learn more about his ordeal and its aftermath, and now he's written a sequel,The Lost Boy, detailing his life in the foster-care system.

Though it's a grim story, A Child Called "It" is very much in the tradition of Chicken Soup for the Couple's Soul and the many books in that upbeat series, whose author Pelzer thanks for helping get his book going. It's all about weathering adversity to find love and Pelzer is an expert witness.--Christine Buttery

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frightening and truly amazing - Rated
A Child Called 'It'

I first read this book 4 years ago whilst on a sun bed in Spain. As soon as I began, I did not put the book down and ended up with bad sunburn.
What an extraordinary and horribly disturbing tale. Dave tells us about the abuse he suffered from his mother, and the distress of his father abandoning him, throwing him into a lonely and lost world. Dave describes the distressing scenarios which we as readers cannot swallow in words - stories of starvation, beatings, mental torture and physical agaony.
The words are written from the perspective of when he was very young, so it is simple to read and very straight forward. As you read his other books you realise how complex he grew to be.
I would only recommend this to people with a strong stomach - ir to those who need their own lives put into a little perspective.

A hard book to like - Rated
As this book is autobiographical you would hate to be too critical. The characters are real as is the plot so what happened happened. However having not ever been a victim of child abuse or had any encounter with its horrors I found this book a little boring. What happened to David was disgusting and this book just chronicles years of abuse and describes in detail many types of torture. After reading it, I said to myself wasn't that dreadful and rolled over and fell asleep without giving it a second thought. I don't think that that is what the author had in mind.

Heartbreaking - Rated
I read one of the most horrific parts of this book on a train, and had to bite my tongue to stop myself from sobbing. The sort of aubse Dave went through doesn't bare thinking about. Don't read this book unless you're prepared for it to leave a perminant mark on you.

Traumatic - Rated
I knew that this would be a traumatic read and subconsciously I have put off reading it. As it has been sitting on our bookshelves for a little over two years I decided I should not put it off for any longer.
It is very short and I read it in its entirety yesterday afternoon. Certainly not a book one reads for pleasure or relaxation. It is not a story just the horrendous facts of a little boys life from the ages of four to twelve. I squirmed in horror as I read this example of the truth being so much scarier than fiction.
Dave Pelzer's young life was a living hell with a Mother who physically and mentally tortured him. She was obviously a very disturbed woman but why was it that his brothers and his Father in particular, were unwilling or unable to stand up to her?
As this all happened over thirty years ago, one can only hope that nowadays such horrific cases of child abuse would never have gone for so long. I really cannot understand why it was so very difficult for the school to rescue David from this situation, which they did eventually. It seemed to take them an eternity to gather the facts they needed! Why oh why did this child not have the strength to take the help that was tentatively offered at various times and just refuse to go home. I believe it was because he was so very very scared that if he did so no one would believe him and he would have ended up a murder victim. It seems to me that against all odds Dave Pelzer showed amazing strength of spirit and survived.
At times it seems unreal and is certainly very disturbing, however child abuse is sadly a reality in our society and for that reason I am glad that I decided to read this account.
I will read the sequel `The Lost Boy' soon as it is also waiting on the bookshelves. It covers the period from age twelve to eighteen, when after his prayers were answered and he was rescued he became a foster child.

I gave this 5 stars not because it was a good book in the literary sense but because it is a bravely related memoir.

A horrific read... - Rated
I bought this book when it first came out and read it in one sitting. It is one of the few books to reduce me to tears in sympathy for the writer.

I thought it took a lot of courage for Dave Pelzer to write this book (and the ones after) as it's obviously not an easy thing to relive never mind write and share with the rest of society.

It is such a heart wrenching account of his childhood and it does make you think how his own mother could be so evil and the amount of child abuse that goes unspoken about as it's still kind of a taboo subject.

The events in this book are horrific and it's hard to believe how a little boy could fight and survive them.

Some of the other reviews of this book go on about the writing style and the editors not doing their job properly but does it need to be written perfectly as long as it gets his message across? As i said before it's not an easy thing to relive never mind write about so who cares if its not fantastically written, read the book for what it is, a terrifying account of child abuse and how one boy managed to get out of the situation and get on with his life no matter how hard it was at times.