Films/Videos The Blind Side 2009 A story featuring Michael Oher who played for the Baltimore Ravens of the US National Football League. The story follows a homeless Michael who has been through the foster care system being taken in by the Tuohy family who encourage him in his football career. External Website

Poets Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift onathan Swift (1667–1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet, and Anglican cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, hence his common sobriquet, "Dean Swift". Swift's father died in Dublin about seven months before his namesake was born.He died of syphilis, which he said he got from dirty sheets when out of town. At the age of one, child Jonathan was taken by his wet nurse to her hometown of Whitehaven, Cumberland, England. He said that there he learned to read the Bible. His nurse returned him to his mother, still in Ireland, when he was three. His mother returned to England after his birth, leaving him in the care of his uncle Godwin Swift (1628–1695), he sent the younger Swift to Kilkenny College age six, Swift graduated in 1682, when he was 15. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Song of the Sea Maid Rebecca Mascull 2016 In the 18th century, Dawnay Price is an anomaly. An educated foundling, a woman of science in a time when such things are unheard-of, she overcomes her origins to become a natural philosopher. Against the conventions of the day, and to the alarm of her male contemporaries, she sets sail to Portugal to develop her theories. There she makes some startling discoveries - not only in an ancient cave whose secrets hint at a previously undiscovered civilisation, but also in her own heart. The siren call of science is powerful, but as war approaches she finds herself pulled in another direction by feelings she cannot control. External Website

Films/Videos The Sea Beast 2022 The Sea Beast (2022) is an animated adventure film which tells the story of a young orphan girl - Maisie Brumble - who runs away from an orphanage and stows onboard the ship of a group of sea monster hunters. Captain Crow is the captain and he has an adopted son, Jacob Holland. Crow is financially supported by the Crown to hunt sea beasts. Maisie decides that the sea beasts shouldn't be hunted and that if they attack a ship, they do so in self-defense. External Website

Authors T Tchin ➝ Back to Top

Autobiography/Memoir Foster Kid Paul Barber 2008 After the death of his mother, Paul and his brothers and sister spent the rest of their childhoods in a succession of children's and foster homes where they found themselves at the mercy of adults more interested in their own welfare than providing a loving home. Paul left care at the age of sixteen, and three years later landed his first acting role, by accident, in the musical 'Hair', which put him on the path to London and a successful career in show business. External Website

Fiction by Care Experienced authors Shadow and Bone (novel) Leigh Bardugo ➝ The Good Guy Susan Beale ➝ Death of the Heart Elizabeth Bowen ➝ Nights at the Circus Angela Carter ➝ Boy Swallows Universe (Novel) Trent Dalton ➝ Oliver Twist Charles Dickens ➝ Great Expectations Charles Dickens ➝ Careful, He Might Hear You (novel) Sumner Locke Elliott ➝ Fairyland Sumner Locke Elliott ➝ Luckenbooth Jenni Fagan ➝ Ruth Elizabeth ➝ Thicker Than Water Kathryn Harrison ➝ Oi: Snowball Meets Some Very Toxic People David Jackson ➝ Being Lara: A Novel Lola Jaye ➝ The White Bird Passes Jessie Kesson ➝ One Hundred Years of Solitude (Novel) Gabriel Garcia Marquez ➝ Emily of New Moon Lucy Maud Montgomery ➝ Shattered Paths Daniel Rolph ➝ The Hobbit J R R Tolkien ➝ Cane Warriors Alex Wheatle ➝ Kemosha of the Caribbean Alex Wheatle ➝ Man Who Lived Underground Richard Wright ➝ The Quiet You Carry Nikki Barthelmess ➝ Mountain in My Shoe. Louise Beech ➝ Rubyfruit Jungle Rita Mae Brown ➝ Karobran: the story of an Aboriginal girl Monica Clare ➝ Lola in the Mirror Trent Dalton ➝ Old Curiosity Shop Charles Dickens et al. ➝ Nothing Natural Jenny Diski ➝ Water under the bridge Sumner Locke Elliott ➝ The Sunlight Pilgrims Jenni Fagan ➝ The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling Henry Fielding ➝ Invisible thread Maree Giles ➝ Cuckoo in the Nest Fran Hill ➝ Orphan Sisters Lola Jaye ➝ Borrowed Body Mason Valerie John ➝ Kim Rudyard Kipling ➝ When the Stars Go Dark Paula McLain ➝ Anne of Green Gables L M Montgomery ➝ Son of Sin Omar Sakr ➝ The Runaway Orphans Pam Weaver ➝ Brixton Rock Alex Wheatle ➝ Brenton Brown Alex Wheatle ➝ Quiet No More Nikki Barthelmess ➝ Nothing Else Louise Beech ➝ Careless Kirsty Capes ➝ Jae-Dee Survives the Home of Many Mothers: Jae-Dee Collier ➝ All Our Shimmering Skies Trent Dalton ➝ David Copperfield: The Personal History of David Copperfield Charles Dickens et al. ➝ State Ward Alan Duff ➝ Eden's lost Sumner Locke Elliott ➝ The Panopticon Jenni Fagan ➝ The Widow's Children Paula Fox ➝ Stone Girl Eleni Hale ➝ Home Bird Fran Hill ➝ The Attic Child Lola Jaye ➝ Trumpet Jackie Kay ➝ The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Stieg Larsson ➝ A Ticket to Ride Paula McLain ➝ His dark materials / Philip Pullman. Philip Pullman ➝ The Queen's Gambit (novel) Walter Tevis ➝ The Lost Orphan Pam Weaver ➝ The Seven Sisters Alex Wheatle ➝ Oranges are not the only fruit Jeanette Winterson ➝ Back to Top

Television Shows Dickensian 2015 Dickensian is a British drama which brings many of Charles Dickens' characters - including those who are Care Experienced - together in the one Victorian neighborhood as a murder is being investigated. External Website

Films/Videos Resistance 2020 Resistance was inspired by French actor Marcel Marceu's work during WWII taking orphaned Jewish children out of Nazi-occupied France. It is said that he was directly involved in the safe removal of 100s of children and that 1000s were saved. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Mothering Sunday (book) Graham Swift 2016 From the Booker Award winner: a luminous, profoundly moving work of fiction that begins with an afternoon tryst in 1924 between a servant girl and the young man of the neighboring house, but then opens to reveal the whole life of a remarkable woman. Twenty-two-year-old Jane Fairchild, orphaned at birth, has worked as a maid at one English country estate since she was sixteen. And for almost all of those years she has been the secret lover to Paul Sheringham, the scion of the estate next door. On an unseasonably warm March afternoon, Jane and Paul will make love for the last time--though not, as Jane believes, because Paul is about to be married--and the events of the day will alter Jane's life forever. As the narrative moves back and forth from 1924 to the end of the century, what we know and understand about Jane--about the way she loves, thinks, feels, sees, remembers--deepens with every beautifully wrought moment. External Website

Activists Black and In Care David Akinsanya 2024 Not long after leaving youth custody, David got involved with a group called Black and In Care. He helped make a powerful video about the experiences of youngsters in the system. The film was used to train social workers and to raise important issues. He often showed the film and watched people come to more understanding just by hearing the lived experiences. David continued his activism and became a researcher for TV, his proudest moment was the making of “Find me a family” which addressed the need to find people to adopt older kids and siblings. He can be found on Twitter @DavidAkinsanya External Website

Children's Fiction We Are Wolves Katrina Nannestad 2021 We Are Wolves (2021) by Australian children's writer, Katrina Nannestad, is the extraordinary story of 3 children left to fend for themselves at the end of WWII. The story begins in October 1944 in East Prussia. The children's father has been constricted but soon the Russian army breaks through the German lines and the rest of the family - 11 year old Liesl, 7 year old Otto, and toddler Mia plus their mother and grandparents abandon the farm. It's not long before the children are on their own and having a range of 'adventures' including meeting up with other orphaned German children known as "wolf children". External Website

Radio & Podcast The floating hell of prison hulks History Extra Podcast 2022 The focus in this podcast are the 'prison hulks' or floating prisons used by the British to 'house' convicts during the 18th and 19th centuries. Former navy ships were docked on the Thames (and at other locations) and male convicts were kept on board until they were transported elsewhere in the empire, including Australia. Boys as young as 8 were kept on board prison hulks, called 'rotten leaky tubs' by reformers. External Website

Writers Patricia Highsmith 1921-1995 Patricia Highsmith (January 19, 1921 – February 4, 1995) was an American novelist and short story writer widely known for her psychological thrillers, including her series of five novels featuring the character Tom Ripley. Highsmith was born Mary Patricia Plangman in Fort Worth, Texas. She was an only child, her parents divorced ten days before their daughter's birth. In 1927, Highsmith, her mother and her adoptive stepfather, artist Stanley Highsmith, whom her mother had married in 1924, moved to New York City. When she was 12 years old, Highsmith was in kinship care, sent to Fort Worth and lived with her grandmother for a year. She called this the "saddest year" of her life and felt "abandoned" by her mother. She wrote 22 novels and numerous short stories throughout her career spanning nearly five decades, and her work has led to more than two dozen film adaptations. Her writing derived influence from existentialist literature, and questioned notions of identity and popular morality. She was dubbed "the poet of apprehension" by novelist Graham Greene. Her first novel, Strangers on a Train, has been adapted for stage and screen numerous times, notably by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951. Her 1955 novel The Talented Mr. Ripley who was orphaned at 5 years old and in kinship care, raised by cold-hearted aunt Dottie, who mocked him as a "sissy"; has been adapted numerous times for film, theatre, and radio. Writing under the pseudonym "Claire Morgan", Highsmith published the first lesbian novel with a happy ending, The Price of Salt, in 1952, republished 38 years later as Carol under her own name and later adapted into a 2015 film. External Website

Television Shows Pennyworth 2019 Pennyworth (2019) is an American television series exploring the pre-Gotham life of Bruce Wayne’s guardian and butler, Alfred Pennyworth Pennyworth (Jack Bannon) is a former British soldier, a member of the SAS, who sets up his own security company in post-WWII London. Bruce Wayne isn't around yet, but Martha and Thomas Wayne do have a child, a daughter Samantha. There’s also a foundling, Katie Browning (Jessye Romeo) in Series 2 who is close to the sadistic sociopath, Bet Sykes (Saloma Faith). And there's the orphaned baby Bet 'adopts' after she kills the baby's mother, Miss Dixon (Sally Tatum). External Website

Films/Videos Foster Care Films - Community Engagement Project 2018 A series of documentary films, currently in production, these films gives a voice to youth in the system. An opportunity for foster youth to share their voice thru storytelling, writing and art An outlet for foster youth to work behind the scenes on a film A social media campaign focused on reframing the discussion about foster care A community engagement project, which connects current/former foster youth to those who have an opportunity to make a difference within the system. External Website

Television Shows Bodies 2023 Bodies is based on the eponymous 2015 graphic novel written by Si Spencer (1961-2021). It is a police procedural “with a twist”. The twist is that the same body is found on Longharvest Lane, Whitechapel, London in 1890, 1941, 2023 and 2053. The death is investigated by 4 different detectives. At the heart of the time-travelling strangeness is Stephen Graham as Sir Julian Harker in 1890 and 1941, and Commander Mannix in 2053. A great-great grandchild of Harker’s is Elias Mannix (as a 15-year-old played by Gabriel Howell) who is also his own great-great grandchild. Elias is born in 2008, taken into care at age 4, and later adopted. In 2023 he blows up London and becomes authoritarian Commander Mannix. External Website

Radio & Podcast A Reading Life, A Writing Life A Reading Life, A Writing Life 2022 Sally Bayley is a writer and Lecturer in English at Hertford College, Oxford, England Sally was so neglected at home as a child that she put herself into the care system at the age of 14. She didn't see her family for the next 12 years. Sally now lives on a boat on the River Thames in Oxford. In this podcast she talks about living on the river and amongst nature, and about her reading and writing life. External Website

Television Shows Unorthodox 2020 Unorthodox is a German-American Netflix series inspired by Deborah Feldman's 2012 memoir, Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots. Esty, a 19 year old woman who grew up in kinship care, escapes from her ultra orthodox Jewish community in Brooklyn, New York, to Berlin, Germany but is chased by her husband. External Website

Writers AUTHORS I External Website