An Invisible Thread: An Invisible Thread: The True Story of an 11-Year-Old Panhandler, a Busy Sales Executive, and an Unlikely Meeting with Destiny / Laura Schroff & Alex Tresniowski

RATINGS

Overall: 3 / 5 stars

Text Level: Easy

Entertainment: Medium

Self-Help: Medium

Genres: Nonfiction, Inspirational, Memoir, Social Issues, Poverty

Page Count: 288

Is this book right for my inmate and me?

Inmates and their family members who have been struggling with poverty, drug abuse, violence, and incarceration for multiple generations without a way to break the awful cycle can find hope in this true story.

Buy on: Target / Amazon / Barnes & Noble

Review By: Blackbird (Inmate)

The opportunities to change one’s fate and destiny to something positive can come from anywhere if you take the chance to trust.

With all odds stacked against an 11-year-old boy growing up in New York, he chose to build a better life for this future with the help of an unlikely friend. Laura Schroff was a high-powered business executive living in New York City during 1960s when she was approached on the corner by a young boy panhandling for change. She decided to take him to lunch never knowing how important in both of their lives that decision would be.

The boy named Maurice was one of the multiple children being raised in government housing by a mother and grandmother that were both drug addicts. His only real memories of his father were an abusive drug addict gang member that attached to anyone he met. Living in the projects the only male role model figures he had were the drug dealers and thieves that filled the building he lived in. At 11 years of age, Maurice believed his only life option for the future was to continue the path his family had set. One day, he met a kind stranger and chose to trust her. That led him to a life of positive change.

This book is an excellent book of hope for inmates and their families that have suffered through drug abuse and poverty through the e years. Many inmates come from households of violence, abuse, and addiction. Sadly, many will leave prison and hails to return to those same types of homes. Being inside jail, I hear other inmates talk about how they wish that they had a better life and their fear that their own children will make the same mistakes. As families, we want each generation to progress further and do better. Reading this book we can find faith and belief that we can start that change ourselves to break the chain of sorrow.

Throughout this story, we read that one of the first steps to breaking the cycle of poverty is to first change how we see ourselves and our possibilities. Maurice’s story is of a boy who was willing to trust others to allow him to see a new world past the restrictions his family had placed. Saving the next generation of our families can start with us.

Book Quotes:

“If love is the greatest gift of all - and I believe it is - then the greatest privilege of all is to be able to love someone.”

“I consider my childhood a gift…It happened to me so I could learn the right way to raise my children. I saw what my father did, and I might have grown up thinking that was the only way…But then I realized there was another way.”