Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival & Hope in an American City

Brilliantly written account of one family’s struggles with homelessness, various public assistance programs and desperate poverty, all while maintaining deep family bonds. Mandatory reading for those who have never been hungry or experienced housing insecurity, this book races along like a gritty urban novel but leaves the reader with a strong understanding of life without privilege but with plenty of racism and judgment.

Don’t be put off by the length - this is an absorbing read and one which has you cheering and shouting in equal measures as you watch both ‘the system’ and Dasani’s family shape her future in varying measures at different times. It is heartbreaking that this story is so current and whilst the author obviously has her views, I feel that the writing was sensitive and balanced. I urge you to buy it.

Great read. Would highly recommend this book.

Elliot’s unfiltered account of life in the underclass is an extraordinary achievement in investigative and immersive journalism. She’s like a war correspondent embedded with a combat unit, but in this case the unit is a troubled family and the battleground is drugs, homelessness, the courts, foster programs, schools, and city welfare agencies.Unfortunately, there are some pathologies you might find in a struggling, impoverished family; self-destructive behavior, missed opportunities, ramifications of poor decisions. But also, at the heart is a family in crisis trying to maintain a semblance of stability in their damaged world. Along the way, bureaucratic and legal decisions tear at the family sending it into a downward spiral despite the efforts of dedicated public servants, especially the selfless and underappreciated teachers and principals who try to shephard at-risk children through a minefield of poverty, poor parenting, and behavioral cries for help.If nothing else, this book should make readers reconsider the efficacy of programs and agencies charged with trying to help troubled families succeed. Are there better ways to support families and help them get on their feet? Are punitive measures against adults likely to destroy their children’s future? These are complicated questions, but as one of the children says as she considers a career working with children of trauma, “Why should other kids have to start way behind in the race of life because of things they couldn’t control or never learned how to control?” Exactly.

This book review is for; ‘Invisible Child: Poverty, Survival and Hope in an American City’; by Andrea Elliott. // Its publication or release date was October 5, 2021; and it showed up on my doorstep on the same day, having pre-ordered it from Amazon; and while I’ve written book reviews before on Amazon, this review is a first of its kind in that I’m submitting this review prior to completing the book. // I was highly motivated to buy the hardcover of this book, and two others, all of which share a somewhat similar theme about ‘Critical Race Theory’ and ‘Systemic Racism’. Two things in particular, motivated me; 1) since both of these culturally sensitive topics are currently being hotly contested, specifically in relation to their validity or the lack thereof, I’ve decided to do my own research on these topics, in order to purposely cut out all the static, noise, and vitriol, from those adamantly against these two topics getting a fair hearing by all those like myself who care and want to educate themselves on these crucial issues, especially during these turbulent times when so called ‘American Patriots’ honestly think that loyally serving their country equals getting involved in an ‘Insurrection’ and/or ‘Domestic Terrorism’; or who hold so called sincere sympathies with those who were involved in the highly questionable behavior in and around the U.S. Capital on January 6, 2021; and, 2) the second motivation to purchase this book was found within just one paragraph within a recent (9-28/10-1-2021) New York Times article, titled: ‘When Dasani Left Home’, which was written by this book’s author (Andrea Elliott), which singular paragraph in its entirety is quoted as follows: “Dasani’s roots in Fort Greene (Brooklyn, N.Y.) reached back four generations, to her great-grandfather Wesley Sykes, who left North Carolina to fight in Italy with the Army’s segregated all-Black regiment, the Buffalo Soldiers. After returning home in 1945 as a triple Bronze Service Star veteran, Sykes married and migrated north to Brooklyn, where it was nearly impossible for a Black family to get a mortgage. While the G.I. Bill lifted millions of white veterans into the middle class – helping them go to college, start businesses and become homeowners – Black veterans were largely excluded. Sykes, who was trained in the Army as a mechanic, wound up mopping floors and pouring concrete in Brooklyn, working more than 30 low-wage jobs. He and his wife, Margaret, settled for a rent-subsidized apartment in Fort Greene Houses, the complex Dasani would come to know as ‘the projects’.” // Having finished this quoted paragraph, I ask the reader of this review to carefully read the above quoted paragraph a second time to purposely try to discover all the myriad ways in which Systemic Racism is being exposed and described therein. // My simple proposition is as follows: If racism is indeed a long standing problem in America; then it stands to reason, that the first step toward finding substantial solutions to eradicate or at least mitigate the destructive consequences of same, would be to inform and educate ourselves about the twin topical issues – Critical Race Theory and Systemic Racism – of our current socially and politically turbulent American culture. // In my limited opinion, this book, ‘Invisible Child’, has more to do with Systemic Racism, than Critical Race Theory, particularly in the form of an exposé which expertly serves to highlight the destructive multi-generational effects of Systemic Racism; and to that point, before closing this review, I would like to recommend two very good books dealing directly with Critical Race Theory, as follows: 1) ‘Critical Race Theory: An Introduction’; by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic; 3rd Edition; Copyright 2017; New York University Press; and, 2) ‘Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed The Movement’; Foreword by, Cornel West; Edited by, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Neil Gotanda, Gary Peller, and Kendall Thomas; Copyright 1995; The New Press, New York; ISBN 978-1-56584-270-0 (hc.); ISBN 978-1-56584-271-7 (pbk.).