Little Peach

March 23, 2015
Based on accounts from two young women lured into prostitution, Kern's (No Way Out) disturbing novel opens in a Brooklyn hospital where 14-year-old Michelle is being interviewed by a social worker while recovering from serious injuries. Subsequent chapters flash back to Michelle's childhood and the tumultuous months that brought her to the hospital. Running away from her drug-addicted mother and her lecherous boyfriend, Michelle travels to New York City with little money and vague plans to meet up with a friend who fled there herself. Lost, hungry, and exhausted, Michelle is approached by a stranger named Devon, who entices her to live with him and two other girls, one of whom is only 12. He promises to care for her and become family, but in return she has to prostitute herself. Drugged and motivated by an intense desire for stability and love, Michelle follows orders until the violence escalates. A grim and unsettling portrait of girls who become trapped by thinking they are out of options. Ages 14âup. Agent: Marcia Wernick, Wernick & Pratt.

February 15, 2015
A 14-year-old flees a terrible home situation only to land in child prostitution. Michelle lives in North Philadelphia with her drug-addicted mother. When Michelle's mom, unable to stop her sexual predator boyfriend from attempting to assault her daughter, evicts Michelle from their home, Michelle has nowhere to go. She hops a bus to New York City, where a young man is kind to her in the bus station. Devon takes Michelle to his home, and soon she finds herself mired in enforced prostitution among the Bloods. She befriends her fellow underage prostitutes, who convince her to use drugs to soften the blow of the repeated rapes. At least Michelle's abuse isn't as horrifying as that of 12-year-old Baby, who's intentionally infantilized and repeatedly sold to pedophiles. Michelle rockets from one variety of victimization to another with little time to develop a relationship with readers, a device that may be true to life (Kern interviewed former child prostitutes as part of her research) but that keeps Michelle and her misery safely at a distance. There's a generic quality to her character that may represent the experience in broad strokes but that gives readers little to latch on to. Though some teen readers may be moved to take action, as the author hopes, more may well just be happy they are not Michelle. Despite clear good intentions, the book's focus on victimization is ultimately distancing, creating a likable-but-alienating protagonist. (Fiction. 14-18)

December 1, 2014

Gr 9 Up-Michelle was raised by her loving grandfather, while her drug-addicted mother was in and out of her life. But when her grandfather dies, the teen has to live with her mother, and avoid her mother's boyfriend's advances. Jealous of the attention being paid to her daughter, the protagonist's mom kicks her out onto the streets of Philadelphia. Michelle heads to New York City with the last of her money to find an old friend there, whom she isn't able to locate. With no money and no one to turn to, Michelle falls victim to Devon, a pimp who comes disguised as a nice guy with money, food, and a place to stay. Before long, the young woman is known as Little Peach. She's popping pills to zone out while working for her "daddy" Devon as a prostitute on Coney Island. When one of Devon's other girls goes missing, Michelle knows it's time to find a way out. Teens will be interested in the author's well-researched novel on human trafficking. However, the spare writing, while good for reluctant readers, makes it hard to connect with Michelle. This leaves readers unable to feel sympathetic toward the main character and the tough choices she faces. The sexual content and physical abuse in this book, while in keeping with the topic, may be disturbing to some readers.-Kelly Jo Lasher, Middle Township High School, Cape May Court House, NJ

Copyright 2014 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2015
Grades 9-12 Fourteen-year-old Michelle wants nothing more than to escape the projects of Philadelphia. When a friend tells her she is making a new life for herself in New York, Michelle follows, but her life as a runaway quickly goes from bad to nightmarish. Told in flashbacks from a hospital emergency room, a battered Michelle remembers how the seemingly nice man from the bus station became her Daddy, offering protection from the streets, only to make her his Little Peach a sex worker. Drawn heavily from true accounts of child prostitutes working in America today, this tells a harrowing and brutal story that is typically left in the shadows. Michelle's innocence is heartbreaking to observe as she and the girls she lives with are fed drugs and sold for sex, essentially held hostage by gang members running a prostitution racket. Violent and gritty without being graphic, this is a powerful tale of one girl's efforts to find a helping hand to pull her from the wreckage of her life.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)