FREE ESSAY ON A CHILD CALLED IT

A CHILD CALLED IT

Title: A Child Called "It"
Author: Dave Pelzer
Number of pages: 181
Date of Publication: 1993
Summary:
A Child Called "It" is a story based on a real life boys tribulations with his mothers
shocking abuse. When he was younger Dave and his family were considered the "perfect"
family. Then, all of a sudden his mother and father started drinking and had problems in
their relationship. Dave started getting the worst treatment imaginable. His mother all
of a sudden treated him as a nobody or an "It". His father wouldn't do anything about it
and it made Dave hate him. She did many horrible things to him that he will never forget.
He had two other brothers but they didn't get any of their mother's harsh beatings or
tortures. David's mother would starve him weeks at a time without giving him even a
morsel of food. He had to steal food from stores and the school to survive. One day he
stole hot dogs from the school cafeteria and someone caught him. When he got home his
mother made him puke it up and then eat it again. She almost went to the extent of making
David eat his baby brother's feces. Another incident was when David was cleaning the
kitchen floor for his mother. She all of a sudden stormed into the kitchen and started
yelling at him. "You've made my life a living hell!" she sneered. "Now it's time I show
you what hell is like!" Right after she said that she took him by the arm, turned on the
gas stove, and burned the flesh on his arm. She then proceeded to make him take off his
clothes and lay on top of the flames. She tortured him for no reason except for her own
sick pleasure. She would also make him drink ammonia, wear tattered clothes, sleep in the
garage, and she even went to the extent of stabbing him and not taking him to the
hospital. This story ended with David saying the Lord's Prayer and praying for God to
save him from his living hell. The sequel to this book is called "The Lost Boy." 
Rating: 9
Evaluation
This is one of the best, yet saddest books that I have ever read. There is so much
reality in this book, but I never knew that reality was ever this awful. It brought me to
a realization that I have never known before. It is extremely sad that something like
this really did happen. The points that I will be evaluating are my least favorite
character, how the author (Dave) described his mother, and how the author described the
setting. 
My least favorite character would have to be the father. Yes, the mother was just as bad,
but she would beat Dave right in front of her husband and he wouldn't do anything about
it. It made me feel like if he really loved his son he would have taken him away in his
arms and never let him return. He kept telling Dave that he would take him away, but it
never happened. The story made me cry whenever Dave's father wouldn't help him out when
he was being tortured by his mom. The main reason that he is my least favorite character
is that he was supposed to be the protector of Dave, not a scared little wimp that stood
in a corner while his flesh and blood was being beaten. 
The way that Dave described his mother was actually pretty shocking. He didn't describe
her with as much venom as I thought he would. If that would have been me I would have
described her with so much bitter hatred that it would have been 100 pages longer. In one
conversation he had with his mother he said, "I know you love me mother because you
brought me into this world, and I love you ." That statement made me so mad because she
had just beaten him up him and he said that. I would have been filled with so much hatred
I wouldn't have even been able to talk, let alone say that I loved her. In a way I
admired him for saying that because he knew that his mother had to love him in some way.

The way Dave described the setting in this book was so vivid and I felt like I was in the
book. He would tell about the garage when he had to sleep in there and he wouldn't leave
anything out. He described the things he saw, the temperature, the pain he felt being
there, and even the faint smell of food that he would not be getting. The setting is what
made me get into the story, because I could envision how his living conditions were and
how he really felt.
This book was very good, but reality orientated. I had no idea that actual people have
and are going through this torture. This book made me have a more open mind to kids that
are outcasts. Some people see a dirty unkept person and automatically think that it was
his/her own fault for their looks. I have decided that it isn't always the kids fault for
their looks or their actions, they could be in as much trouble as Dave was in.