Table of Contents
This book is dedicated with love
to Little Lauren and the 39 million
survivors of childhood sexual abuse
in the United States.
Shed the shame, break the silence,
because its always ok to tell.
Foreword
If you didnt know Lauren Books story, you might think she had the perfect life. As a child, the eldest daughter of a wealthy Miami lobbyist, Lauren had blond pop star looks, lived in a huge house on the water and had a live-in nanny. But Lauren held a deep, dark secret inside her for most of her childhood. From the time she was thirteen until she was nearly seventeen, someone living inside her home was physically and sexually abusing her. Someone she trusted. Someone she loved.
I met Lauren while shooting a documentary for the Oprah Winfrey Network about sex offenders. Lauren was inside a classroom filled with third graders. She and her partner, Tara, were teaching the kids how to determine when an adult is acting inappropriately. At the time I write this, there are over 700,000 registered sex offenders in the United States, and that number is growing steadily every week.
Lauren had a childlike way about her. She employed a higherpitched voice when talking to the kids, as though she was one of them. But while she sounded like a kid and even looked liked one, she had a very serious message to get across.
Lauren never told the kids that when she was a little girl her live-in nanny was forcing sex on her. Instead, she and Tara asked the kids to draw pictures of people whom they considered bad or untrustworthy. Not surprisingly, most of the kids drew pictures of men wearing black clothes and masks. Some of them carried big guns and wore mean faces. Almost all of the characters depicted in the kids pictures were strangers. Lauren told me that kids have been conditioned to think that this is how bad people look. They dont look like the people who live inside their homes. They dont look like the people who regularly say I love you.
Lauren Books father, Ron, has been a staple of Miamis upper class for as long as she can remember. He drives around in a fancy Audi R8 and is regularly seen in the society photos in the local glossy magazines. Because of how public his life is, the Book family learned to hold things in, to keep private matters private. One of the biggest secrets the family kept was that Laurens mother had been struggling with depression for years. She had, for all practical purposes, checked out.
So when the Books live-in nanny started sexually abusing little Lauren, she didnt say anything. Even though she knew what was happening to her was wrong, she didnt want to embarrass the family or allow the lid to come off the sealed container of their home lives. And with a father who was traveling all the time and a near-despondent mother, Laurens nanny gave the little girl the attention and the affection Lauren thought she needed.
Lauren endured years of physical, sexual, and psychological torture as a child but somehow found the courage to confront her abuser. With the help of her father who stands firmly by his daughters side, Lauren has become a relentless crusader for kids and women everywhere who have been violated. Its hard enough to hear about the dark place that little Lauren Book inhabited for so many years. I imagine that many people would want to lock the horrifying memories away and move on in silent anonymity. But Lauren bravely shares her testimony in a very public way so that people will know that the sexual exploitation of a child knows no economic boundaries.
Reading the pages of Laurens book, your heart will break. You will find yourself utterly shocked and enraged. But you will be inspired by the powerful and courageous voice that has emerged from this young woman who was robbed of her childhood by a sexually violent predator: one of hundreds of thousands out there, many of whom work inside peoples homes or places where children congregate.
The world is lucky to have Lauren and her father out there advocating, because neither of them will stop until families are made aware of the dangers that lurk in unexpected places.
Lisa Ling
As the field correspondent for The Oprah Winfrey Show and contributor to ABC News Nightline and National Geographics Explorer, Lisa Ling has reported from dozens of countries; covering stories about gang rape in the Congo, bride burning in India and the Lords Resistance Army in Uganda, among other issues that are too often ignored. She is a contributing editor for USA Todays USA Weekend magazine. Our America with Lisa Ling launched on OWN: the Oprah Winfrey Network in 2011.
The Black Swan
November, 2001
Its been three months since I said the words Id practiced silently for years, so scared of what might happen if I said them out loud.
My nanny has been forcing me to have sex with her since I was thirteen.
This morning Im in fifth-period art class, trying to finish the last project for my junior year portfolio, which is due in three days. At school its easier not to think about everything thats happened since I found the courage to tell. At least here no one knows about it yet. Home is a lot harder. There, its as if a bomb went off in our house after the truth came out, and it left a crater so deep you cant see the bottom. It feels like maybe I lost an arm and my sister a leg, but we all pretend we can make things normal if we just dont talk about it.
Of course, having the sheriffs deputies around searching for evidence and interviewing each of us one at a time makes that pretty tough. Twice, Ive had to go down to the sheriffs station to call Waldy, thats Waldina my abuser, on her cell phone with detectives listening in. Theyre trying to get her to incriminate herself, but shes too smart for that. My biggest fear, the thing that keeps me up most nights, is the possibility that shell sneak back to our house to kidnap or hurt me. If she gets her hands on me, I know shell kill me.
Two weeks after Waldy fled Miami, Dad was already worried that the police were not doing enough to apprehend her. So he hired a private detective who located her in Oklahoma City, and tracked her movements through the months of September and October. All along, Dad relayed whatever information he got to the Broward County sheriff who gave it to the Oklahoma City police. The maddening thing during this time is that everyone knows where Waldy is living; they even know about her new volunteer job coaching ten-year-old girls soccer. But our sheriff says its up to his counterpart in Oklahoma City to do the actual apprehension of any suspect dwelling in his city. And for whatever reason, theyre not acting.
And this is how it goes from the middle of August to almost the end of November, when I just cant take it anymore. That was three days ago. When I ask Dad for the umpteenth time why they still havent apprehended her, Im crying so hard he calls the Broward sheriff while Im sitting there next to him. I can only hear Dads side of the conversation.
Listen, my family is at the end of our rope. If the Oklahoma City sheriff doesnt act in the next forty-eight hours, Im going to have to take my handgun and drive to Oklahoma City to get the bitch myself.... No, I wont calm down. My little girl cant sleep or eat with that woman still out there.
