Книги, похожие на «Amanda Bath, Disaster in Paradise»

A heartwarming collection of stories from a woman who brings together disadvantaged children and abandoned racehorses, with remarkable results.Thirteen-year-old Sophie hadn’t uttered a word to anyone for over two years when she got out of her parents car at a remote farm in Devon. Her parents were beside themselves with worry, and at the end of their tether, but try as they might, nothing seemed to make a difference. They’d heard about a place called Greatwood through friends – where owners Helen and Michael Yeadon looked after retired racehorses – and decided to take Sophie along for a visit.Helen asked Sophie to help her change the dressings on the infected cuts on the legs of Darcy Day, one of their more troubled horses, and it was instantly clear that these two had some kind of special connection. Darcy Day would normally back away from people, but this time she lowered her head and stepped forward, to let Sophie stroke her nose. It was the start of an incredible relationship that would transform both horse and child, and it gave Michael and Helen an idea.They registered as a charity, moved to bigger premises, and began inviting children with a wide range of learning disabilities to volunteer to help with the animals. The results were amazing – traumatised horses and anxious or disturbed children bonded with each other, and every week little miracles were happening before their eyes.Boys with diagnoses such as Asperger’s Syndrome or Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or those who’d been excluded from school for unruly behaviour, flourished through the discipline of working on the farm. Girls made timid and anxious by abusive backgrounds or school bullies came out of the shells. In this book are twenty of the most incredible tales of children who were given back their futures by the unique and extraordinary institution of Greatwood.

Little Drifters can either be read as a full-length eBook or in 4 serialised eBook-only parts.This is PART 4 of 4 (Chapters 19-24 of 24).The harrowing true story of a travelling Irish family bonded by love, broken apart by life, and then betrayed by their carers in a cruel convent in Ireland.“For those who we lost along the way, I tell this story. For all the children who suffered in this terrible place. For all those I consider my brothers and sisters; the ones who died, the ones who lost their minds, the ones who drown their memories everyday in a bottle of whisky, I tell this for you.Because in the end we are all brothers and sisters – and if we don’t feel that bond of love between each other, just as human beings, then we are nothing. We are no better than the monsters that ran the convents.”Based in Ireland in the 1960s and 70s, Kathleen’s story is a story of extreme hardship, suffering and abuse. It is the story of 11 siblings, abandoned by their mother and torn from their father, incarcerated in convents and then driven apart in the cruellest ways imaginable; it is the story of their ruined childhoods and their fight for recompense. But more than that, it is a story of courage, survival and the incredible strength of sibling bonds against overwhelming adversities.Out of terrible darkness comes a remarkable story. In the tradition of Irish storytelling, Kathleen offers a mesmerising account of her family’s experience.