Writers Alan Duff Alan Duff (b. 1950) is a Maori writer with Ngati Rangitihi and Tuwharetoa ancestry. He is best known for his novel Once Were Warriors (1990) which was adapted for film by Lee Tamahori in 1994. Alan Duf grew up in a state housing area in Rotorua. After his parents separated when he was 10, Alan lived with a Maori aunt & uncle at Whakarewarewa. He was expelled from school and became a state ward at Hamilton Boys Home, subsequently living in kinship care again with an uncle. When he was 15, Alan Duff was sentenced to Waikeria borstal for assault & breaking & entering. After a while and with lots of convictions for petty offences, Duff went to London which signalled a turning point. Back in New Zealand, Duff began to write full time in 1985. Once Were Warriors made Duff famous and he began writing a column for the Evening Post. He currently writes for the New Zealand Herald. In 1995 Duff launched his Books in Homes Scheme, a program to foster literacy amongst children from low-SES backgrounds. That same year he was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire for services to literature. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Burial Rites Hannah Kent 2014 Burial Rites is set in Iceland. In 1829 Agnes Magnusdottir is sentenced to death for her part in the murder of two men. As the story unfolds, we learn that Agnes was in foster care as child. External Website

Biography of Care Experienced People How to Create the Perfect Wife: The True Story of One Gentleman, Two Orphans an Experiment to Create the Ideal Woman Wendy Moore 2014 This is the story of Thomas Day who, in 1769, decided to train a wife for himself. He chose 2 x 12 year olds from the Foundling Hospital in London and set about training them. Thomas Day's bizarre experiments didn't work; Lucretia was apprenticed to a milliner and 2 years later, Sabrina was sent to boarding school. External Website

Actors Sarah Bernhardt French actor, Sarah Bernhardt (circa 1844-1923), was in foster care for 4 years from the age of 3. Sarah Bernhardt was born in Paris ‘illegitimately’ to 16 year old Dutch-Jewish Youle Van Hard, a courtesan. The details of the father are unknown. By the time she was 3, Sarah was in foster care. She was sent to live in a small peasant home in a small village in Brittany, in the northwest of France, approximately 456km from Paris. In foster care, Sarah learned to speak Breton rather than French. As an adult, Sarah Bernhardt starred in some of the most popular French plays of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including La Dame Aux Camelias by Alexandre Dumas, fils; Ruy Blas by Victor Hugo; Fédora and La Tosca by Victorien Sardou; and L'Aiglon by Edmond Rostand. She also played male roles, including Shakespeare's Hamlet. Rostand called her "the queen of the pose and the princess of the gesture", while Hugo praised her "golden voice". She made several theatrical tours around the world, and was one of the first prominent actresses to make sound recordings and to act in motion pictures. External Website

Autobiography/Memoir The Convent Marie Hargreaves 2020 When a fancy car pulls up outside six-year-old Marie's home in 1959, her dad tells her she is going on holiday. But little does she know she will not see her home again for four long years. Her family cannot afford to keep her at home. Marie tells the story of how she was taken away from a poor, but happy and loving home life, to live in a convent - away from everyone and everything she holds dear. Her hair is bluntly chopped, her clothes are taken away, and her name is changed. Then a horrific ritual of physical, sexual and mental abuse begins. Even after the convent closes, Marie is unable to share details of her suffering with anyone. But when a police investigation is launched, and she realises that the time has finally come to tell the truth... External Website

Fiction Featuring Care Experience Mad Mabel Sally Hepworth 2025 Australian writer Sally Hepworth was at an event promoting one of her books when an elderly woman approached. The woman said: I’ve been thinking about murdering my next-door neighbour … I know that I’m going to get away with it … because there are 2 groups of people that are never suspected of murder, & those are old women & little girls (The Book Show, ABC Radio National). After learning about Mary Bell, she wrote Mad Mabel (2025). Mabel Waller becomes the young female killer in Australia, convicted of murder in 1959 at the age of 15 & subsequently institutionalised. The novel shifts between Mabel’s present life as the elderly Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick, and young Mabel who has a difficult childhood despite the family money. External Website

Television Shows Under a Dark Sun 2025 Under a Dark Sun (2025) is a French family drama series. The plot follows 25-year-old Alba Mazier (Ava Baya), a single mother who takes a seasonal job at a luxurious rose growing estate in the village of Eze on the French Riveria. It’s not long before Alba becomes a suspect in the murder of the patriarch who runs the estate, Arnaud Lasserre (Thibault de Montalembert). The suspicions arise because Arnaud has left Alba a share of his estate in his will. This is the first time Alba becomes aware her parents aren’t her biological parents. *Spoiler Alert* There are more family secrets divulged during the 6-part series, one being that Alba isn’t Arnaud’s daughter but Mathieu’s. Mathieu (Guillaume Gouix) is Arnauld’s son. External Website

Autobiography/Memoir Twelve Years a Slave Solomon Northup 1853 Twelve Years a Slave is an 1853 memoir and slave narrative by American Solomon Northup as told to and written by David Wilson. Solomon Northup was a free Black resident of New York State who was drugged on a trip to Washington, D.C. in the spring of 1841 and sold to a dealer of enslaved people. Beaten and chained, he was transported by ship to a New Orleans market and suffered more than a decade of servitude on Louisiana plantations. Northup had to hide his literacy or risk violence. And he was unable, for years, to get word to anyone in the North to let them know where he was. Fortunately, he was eventually able to send messages which prompted legal action that secured his freedom. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience The Daughter of Time Josephine Tey (2) 2022 Another of the Josephine Tey books published by Penguin in 2022 is The Daughter in Time (1951). Inspector Alan Grant is in hospital and begins investigating the story of Richard III and the allegations he had ordered the murder of 2 nephews - 12 year old Edward, Prince of Wales (b. 1470) and briefly Edward V, King of England (although never crowned) and his younger brother, Richard, Duke of York (b. 1473). Grant concludes that the allegations against Richard III are unwarranted. However, it does seem to be the case that the 2 boys were living in the Tower of London and were away from their parents. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience To Die For David Baldacci 2024 To Die For (2024) by American writer David Baldacci revolves around the guardianship of an orphaned girl. As the story opens, 12-year-old Betsy Odom is in the care of the FBI. Her parents have recently died and her uncle, Danny Glass, wants to adopt the child. However, Danny Glass is the defendant in a federal prosecution and is out on bail. He’s wearing an ankle monitor and has had his passport removed. Travis Devine (this is the 3rd in the series of Travis Devine books), an ex-Army officer who now works undercover for Homeland Security, is tasked with supervising meetings between Betsy Odom and her uncle. External Website

Actors Gianna Simone Gianna Simone (born December 22, 1989) is an American actress, model, and producer. Gianna Simone grew up in East Boston in what she describes as a “tough setting”; she was physically and emotionally abused. When she was 14, Gianna was put into foster care, going from home to home while a girls’ home was her base. She began her modeling career at the age of 16 and moved to Los Angeles when she was 21 to pursue a career in acting.Gianna Simone has appeared in roles in the feature films Star Trek Into Darkness (2013), Mother's Day (2016), I Can Only Imagine (2018), Unbroken: Path to Redemption (2018), and several television series. Gianna has set up the Gianna Simone Foundation with the aim of mentoring young people in foster care and to rescue animals. External Website

Blogs/Web Pages/Articles I’ve Been In A Bad Mood Chris Chmielewski 2016 Chris Chmielewski is the Creator, Owner and Editor of Foster Focus Magazine, America's only monthly foster care magazine. He spent five years in foster care and was expelled from high school just before graduation when he aged out of foster care. In this article Chmielewski talks about being annoyed with the Superhero title: Orphan Fight, that features Batman and Robin. External Website

Children's Fiction Delly Duck (4-8 years) Holly Marlow 2021 When Delly Duck lays an egg, she is excited for it to hatch. But she doesn’t really know how to keep an egg safe, or how to look after her chick when he hatches. See how a concerned goose tries to help Delly to learn how to care for her chick, in this touching adoption story. External Website

News - broadcast, print, internet, magazine articles Statues of Archie Roach and Ruby Hunter erected at historical Aboriginal meeting place ABC News (Australia) 2024 Music legends Ruby Hunter (1955-2010) and Archie Roach (1956-2022) have recently been honoured with the erection of a statue in the Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy. Both Ruby Hunter & Archie Roach were members of the Stolen Generation, and Atherton Gardens – where the statue is located – is where Archie Roach reunited with his Aboriginal family. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience All the Sinners Bleed S.A. Cosby 2023 All the Sinners Bleed (2023) is a crime novel by “Southern noir” writer, S.A. Cosby. Titus Crown is a former FBI agent who returns to his small Virginian hometown and becomes Charon County’s first Black sheriff. The novel opens with a school shooting and moves quickly to a story of a group of paedophiles and serial killers who’ve been terrorising teenage African Americans for years. *Spoiler Alert* When of the gang members is a young man who was removed from his mother at birth and placed with another, brutalising family. External Website

Films/Videos Spiderman Spider-Man is a superhero character created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Peter Parker is an awkard orphaned teenager living with relatives and being bullied at school when he is bitten by a spider and develops super powers. Spider-Man began life as a comic book character and started appearing in film in 1977 and for television in 1978. Sony Pictures acquired the rights to the character in 1998 and produced the trilogy starring Tobey Maguire (2002-2007) and the Amazing Spider-Man films (2012 and 2014) starring Andrew Garfield. The latest Spider-Man is No Way Home (2021) starring Tom Holland as Peter Parker. External Website

Television Shows Scarpetta 2026 Scarpetta (2026) is an American series based on the eponymous novels by American writer, Patricia Cornwell & created by Liz Sarnoff. The series follows Kay Scarpetta (Nicole Kidman) who is a brilliant forensic pathologist. The story moves between the present & the beginning of Scarpetta’s career, during the late 1990s. During the late 1990s, Kay’s niece, Lucy (Savannah Lumar) is living with her aunt Kay after her mother, Dorothy (Jamie Lee Curtis), disappears to Hawaii to get married. In the present, Lucy (Ariana DeBose) is living on a property owned by Kay Scarpetta &, a computer wizz, helps her aunt out in solving a crime. External Website

Writers Charmian London 1871-1955 Charmian Kittredge London (1871 – 1955) was an American writer and the second wife of Jack London. Charmian's mother, poet Dayelle (Daisy) Wiley, was too sick to care for her baby girl when Charmian was born, so Daisy's sisters cared for her. When Charmian was six, Daisy died and guardianship transferred to Daisy's sister Netta and her husband Roscoe Eames. Charmian married Jack London in 1905 and was his secretary and fellow-adventurer. She promoted Jack's work after his death, keeping his popularity alive. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Bridge of Clay Markus Zusak 2019 The Dunbar boys bring each other up in a house run by their own rules. A family of ramshackle tragedy - their mother is dead, their father has fled - they love and fight, and learn to reckon with the adult world. It is Clay, the quiet one, who will build a bridge; for his family, for his past, for his sins. He builds a bridge to transcend humanness. To survive. A miracle and nothing less. External Website

Actors Monroe Martin III Monroe Martin III is an actor and writer, known for Late Night (2019), Charlamagne & Friends (2013) and Master of None (2015). Monroe Martin III grew up in foster care in the United States. External Website