Fiction by Care Experienced authors Being Lara: A Novel Lola Jaye 2012 A poignant and provocative story of adoption, self-discovery, and the meaning of family, Being Lara by author Lola Jaye (By the Time You Read This) is an unforgettable tale of three women—British mother, Nigerian birth mother, and 30-year-old daughter—the choices they made, and the fragile bond they try to create across time and continents. Intelligent and touching, Being Lara is exquisite contemporary fiction with heart and soul that will resonate with readers of Cecilia Ahearn, Thrity Umrigar, and Shilpi Gowda. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Ordeal by Innocence (Novel) Agatha Christie 1958 Agatha Christie’s Ordeal by Innocence was first published in 1958. There are 5 adoptees in the novel, all now adults and adopted into the one family by Rachel Argyle. Rachel was killed 2 years before the story opens. Rachel Argyle had set up a refuge for children whose homes were bombed during WWII. She was so enthusiastic about her work she adopted 5 children, “those from particularly unsatisfactory homes or who were orphans” (53, 2017, HarperCollins). A central theme in Ordeal by Innocence is nature vs nurture, whether a privileged environment can overcome hereditary ‘weaknesses’. Christie’s psychological approach was, apparently, much criticised as was an element of racism in the story. Ordeal by Innocence was adapted for film in 1985 and for television in 2007 (ITV), 2009 (France) France, and 2018 (BBC One). External Website

Children's Fiction Close Your Pretty Eyes (11-13 years) Sally Nicholls 2013 Eleven-year-old Olivia has been in care since she was five, and is just beginning her sixteenth placement. Her new home is a secluded farmhouse, centuries old, where she slowly bonds with her foster family. But the house holds dark secrets. Olivia discovers that it was once a notorious baby farm, where unwanted children were left to die. She becomes convinced that the place is haunted. She is desperate to save her new family from the ghosts. The danger is real - but does it come from the twisted mind of a very disturbed child? A powerful and thrilling story from one of today's most exciting young writers. External Website

Academic Articles Facing the cliff-edge: care-experienced graduates’ access to and progression through taught postgraduate study in the United Kingdom Zoe Baker 2024 Support for care-experienced students stops after undergraduate study, creating an “undergraduate cliff edge.” This lack of ongoing help makes postgraduate study risky and reinforces instability. The study calls for policies to ensure fair, continued support. External Website

News - broadcast, print, internet, magazine articles Border officers saw a couple behaving oddly with a baby - and uncovered a mystery BBC 2025 In this BBC article, Sanchia Berg and Tara Mewawalla tell the story of Lucy, a child whose identity as at 26 April this year, was not known. The child, according to the article, “seems to have been born in rural Nigeria in September 2022, and given to an orphanage when she was just three days old.” She has been in social care in Manchester since her “parents” were apprehended by Border Force. She is in her 3rd foster home since arriving in the UK. Raphael Ossai claimed to be the Lucy’s father, and Oluwakemi Olasanoye, the girl’s mother. “The court heard that on 20 June 2023, Ossai and Olasanoye unlawfully brought Lucy to the UK from Lagos, via Addis Ababa. Olasanoye had a visa to work in the UK and agreed to travel with Ossai and Lucy…In this BBC article, Sanchia Berg and Tara Mewawalla tell the story of Lucy, a child whose identity as at 26 April this year, was not known. The child, according to the article, “seems to have been born in rural Nigeria in September 2022, and given to an orphanage when she was just three days old.” She has been in social care in Manchester since her “parents” were apprehended by Border Force. She is in her 3rd foster home since arriving in the UK. Raphael Ossai claimed to be the Lucy’s father, and Oluwakemi Olasanoye, the girl’s mother. “The court heard that on 20 June 2023, Ossai and Olasanoye unlawfully brought Lucy to the UK from Lagos, via Addis Ababa. Olasanoye had a visa to work in the UK and agreed to travel with Ossai and Lucy… Ossai and Olasanoye, pleaded guilty to immigration offences and were sentenced to 18 months in prison followed by deportation.” External Website

Performing Arts Singer-songwriter, musician, record producer, dancer, actor. Prince Prince Rogers Nelson (1958 – 2016) was an American singer-songwriter, musician, record producer, dancer, and actor. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest musicians of his generation. Prince was born in Minneapolis to jazz musician, John Nelson, and jazz singer, Mattie Shaw. His parents separated when Prince was about 10. From then he alternated living with both of them, even after his mother remarried. Hayward Baker, Prince’s stepfather, took the boy to see James Brown, an important influence on Prince’s songwriting and performing. Prince became good friends with Andre Anderson (to become known as Andre Cymone), a newcomer to Prince’s school at around age twelve. After Prince became tired of moving between his mother’s and his father’s house, he ran away and moved in with Andre and his family. Prince was still in his teens when he signed a recording contract with Warner Bros. His second album, Prince (1979), sold more than 1 million copies. External Website

Writers Michael Maclear 1929-2018 Michael Maclear (1929 – December 25, 2018) was an award-winning Anglo-Canadian journalist, documentary filmmaker, and former correspondent for various CBC programs and for CTV's W5. He is the great-great-grand-nephew of South African astronomer Sir Thomas Maclear.Born in London, and according to his daughter, Kyo Maclear, Michael Maclear was abandoned by his parents to a foster home. He began work at age 14, as a copy boy on Fleet Street and from there he became a reporter for the Chicago Tribune in their London office. In 1954, Maclear migrated to Canada and began work with the Canadian Broadcasting Commission in 1955. Michael Maclear made his first documentary, a 26 part series, Vietnam: The Ten Thousand Day Way which first aired in 1980, in response to his time in Vietnam. In 2013, Michael Maclear was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Canadian Journalism Foundation. External Website

Performing Arts French singer-songwriter, cabaret performer, actress Edith Piaf Édith Piaf (1915 – 1963) was a French singer-songwriter, cabaret performer and film actress noted as France's national chanteuse and one of the country's most widely known international stars. Edith Piaf was born Edith Giovanna Gassion in the twentieth arrondissement, then a poor area of Paris. She was immediately abandoned by her mother, street performer Annetta Maillard, who left the tiny baby with her mother. Edith’s father, Louis Gassion, wasn’t impressed with the grandmother’s quarters and took his daughter to live with his mother in Normandy, France. Edith's paternal grandmother ran a bordello and sex workers helped care for the child. At 14 (or perhaps younger), Edith became part of her father’s troupe of itinerant street performers and acrobats. Night club owner, Louis Leplee, presented her as a talented street kid when she was 19. Although she was with Leplee for only 12 months until his death, she became a “huge success” and followed her night club appearances with radio, records and song-writing. She probably never really recovered from her difficult childhood, but by the Second World War, Edith Piaf “had become one of the top entertainers in Paris.” When the War ended, Edith Piaf toured internationally, endearing herself to many and becoming a household name. External Website

Poets Stevie Smith Stevie Smith Stevie Smith, English Poet and novelist born Florence Margaret Smith(1902–1971), was born in Kingston Upon Hull. She was 3 years old when her father ran away to sea and her mother moved to Palmers Green where she stayed until her death. At 5 years old, she was sent to a sanatorium near Broadstairs, Kent, where she remained for three years due to developing tuberculous peritonitis. Being away from her mother was very painful and this was when she had her first throughts of suicide which would haunt her throughout her life. Her mother died when she was 16. An aunt looked after Stevie and elder sister Molly. External Website

Non Fiction The Market in Babies Marian Quartly 2013 The Market in Babies (2013) by Marian Quartly, Shurlee Swain & Denise Cuthbert tells the history of adoption in Australia and is the result of a 5 year-long research project. As the authors point out in the introduction, 50 years ago (from the time of writing) the generally accepted view in Australia was that adoption was a permissible way to form a family, and it was a means of providing for orphans. It was also a secret within many families. That view is now contested as support groups formed from the 1980s and exposed the pain of separation felt by mothers and children. The number of adoptions per year has declined significantly. The Market in Babies includes excerpts from the stories people contributed to the project website. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Swimming for beginners Nicola Gill 2023 Loretta has her life all planned out – challenging job, engaged to a nice but dull man – and it definitely doesn’t include children. Then, an unexpected tragedy at an airport throws six-year-old Phoebe, complete with glitter fairy wings, into her life and upends it completely. The perfect mix of funny, poignant and heartwarming. External Website

Television Shows Goliath 2016 Legal drama series. Main character is lawyer Billy McBride (Billy Bob Thornton). His new 2IC is Patty Solis-Papagian (Nina Arianda), who was in foster care. She is a lawyer and a real estate agent. There are other Care Experienced characters in the series, all playing the roles of villians. In the 4th season of legal drama, Patty Solis-Pagian is now a swanky corporate lawyer. There's a kinship care character too. Kate Zax (Clara Wong) is the niece of George Zax and was in his care from a young age. She's a chemist at Zax Pharma and concerned about the addictive properties of the drug the corporation promotes as non-addictive. External Website

Non Fiction Australian Gospel Lech Blaine 2024 Australian Gospel: A Family Saga (2024) by Australian writer Lech Blaine is the story of 2 families. Lech Blaine is the only biological child of Lenore & Tom Blaine. Lenore & Tom were the foster carers of 3 Shelley children, Steve, John & Hannah (amongst others). Michael & Mary Shelley have had all 4 of their children removed by the Queensland state and they have a track record of harassing, trespassing and threatening politicians as well as foster carers – including the Blaines. Lech Blaine has undertaken hours of research to tell this complicated story. He’s interviewed family members, read case files and his mother’s diary, and reviewed court reports as well as newspapers accounts of Shelley exploits. External Website

Autobiography/Memoir Your Honour Can I Tell You My Story? Brierley et al 2019 Brierley Andi (Author), Hopkinson Jim (Foreword). The challenging story of a young person’s progress through care, prison and social rejection to youth justice specialist. It charts failures to connect with and modify the author’s chaotic early life moving from place to place, school to school, fragmented parenting and poor role models. Encircled by crime, drugs and baffling adults, Andi Brierley ended up first in a young offender institution then prison where he learned to think like a prisoner for his own survival, making everything harder for everybody on release. Until he determined to change and others saw his unenviable past could be put to good use. External Website

Blogs/Web Pages/Articles Ploughshares at Emerson College Kelly Amber 2015 In the wide realm of literature, having parents is a convenience that escapes many characters. The Orphan is one of the most prominent characters in literature, in part because the absence of parental figures automatically fuels so many possible motivations. External Website

Radio & Podcast Haiti's first and only king History Extra Podcast 2025 In this History Extra Podcast, Marlene Daut, Professor of French & African Diaspora Studies @ Yale University talks about her book, The first & last King of Haiti, The Rise and Fall of Henry Christophe. Henry Chistophe (1767-1820) was likely born to a slave woman in the then British colony of Grenada. At the age of only 12 he was separated from his mother and fought in the American Revolution in the Battle of Savannah. By then Grenada had been captured for France. Christophe rose to power in the Haitian revolutionary military beginning with the slave uprising of 1791. After Haiti declared independence on 1 January 1804, Jean-Jacques Dessalines became emperor. When Dessalines was assassinated in 1806, the country split into 2 states, with Christophe declaring himself king of Haiti in the north in 1811. After Christophe’s death in 1820, the country was reunified. External Website

Behind the Scenes Mark Opitz Mark Opitz is an Australian record producer and audio engineer who has produced AC/DC, Australian Crawl plus other distinguished bands. He has won numerous awards for his work. Mark Opitz was born in Melbourne. After his parents separated, Mark was cared for by his mother. The family relocated to Brisbane and his parents reconciled. However, after his parents again separated, Mark was put into in foster care before being left at the Margaret Marr Memorial Home for Boys, a Methodist home that ran from 1924 until 1973. Mark Optiz moved to Sydney after he left the Home for Boys and began his career with the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) IN 1971. External Website

Authors P Trauma Proof ➝ Free Loaves on Fridays: The Care System As Told By People Who Actually Get It ➝ Back to Top

Authors H Stone Girl ➝ Cuckoo in the Nest ➝ Thicker Than Water ➝ Home Bird ➝ Back to Top

Autobiography/Memoir Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood Oliver Sacks 2002 In Uncle Tungsten we meet Sacks' extraordinary family, from his surgeon mother (who introduces the fourteen-year-old Oliver to the art of human dissection) and his father, a family doctor who imbues in his son an early enthusiasm for housecalls, to his "Uncle Tungsten," whose factory produces tungsten-filament lightbulbs. We follow the young Oliver as he is exiled at the age of six to a grim, sadistic boarding school to escape the London Blitz, and later watch as he sets about passionately reliving the exploits of his chemical heroes-in his own home laboratory. External Website