TROUBLED

Masterpiece Evening Standard Fascinating The Economist Best Titles of 2024In 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