The book A Child Called “It” is about a young boy who was abused throughout his childhood. This inspirational tear-jerker was written by Dave Pelzer, a boy who grew up in an abusive home. He was one of four boys and was the only one who his mother was violent and abusive towards. He had two older brothers and one younger, but for some unknown reason his mother only felt horribly towards him. She was so horrible to him that it’s amazing he is still alive. Not only did she mentally abuse him by making him sit somewhere for hours saying “I hate myself” over and over, but she also physically abused him beyond belief. Some of the things that she did to him where so horrible, at times it was hard to continue reading the book because tears were brought to my eyes and my stomach was churning. The book is written in the perspective of Dave Pelzer when he was a child; it describes the horrible things his mother did to him. A specific strength in terms of writing style was the way the author captured the reader’s attention. The voice was very strong throughout the whole book and you could really feel the pain and struggle that he faces every day. He was able to make the readers really connect with him and allow them to feel everything emotionally. A specific weakness of the book in terms of characterization is that he didn’t really take a big look into the other characters other than him mother. For example, even though he does briefly say how his brother’s treated him he doesn’t really allow us to fully understand the relationship with his brothers. This book allows people to understand and get a closer look at child abuse, which is still a problem today in our world. The book gives you an insight on how evil people can be and how well some people hide the fact that they abuse their children. There is a lesson behind it; if you know about a child who is being abused or if you suspect it, you should do all that is in your power to help them. Often abused children can’t do anything to help themselves and they need outside forces to help them survive and be taken away so they can be safe. I would defiantly recommend this book to others. It was such an inspirational story of how such a young boy had the will to survive and not let his horrible mother win her “game”. The book was so interesting that it was hard to put it down, it was such a sad story but it taught so much and was a very good read.