Twilight Children

Three Voices No One Heard Until a Therapist Listened

By: Torey Hayden

Narrated by: Jorjeana Marie

A light in the darkness for severely troubled children, former special education teacher Torey Hayden faced three of her most extraordinary challenges after she left the classroom. Nine-year-old Cassandra, kidnapped by her father and found starving, dirty, and picking through garbage cans - a child prone to long silences and erratic, violent behavior, whose hard-won recollections of the nightmare she endured could not be fully trusted. Charming, charismatic four-year-old Drake, who would speak only in private to his mother - his tough, unbending grandfather's demands for an immediate cure threatened to cause the delightful boy and his family irreparable harm. And though she had never worked with adults, Hayden agreed to help fearful and silent 82-year-old massive stroke victim Gerda - discovering in the process that a treatment's successes could prove nearly as heartbreaking as its limitations.

©2005 Torey Hayden (P)2014 Audible Inc.

Not great, not terrible-It was good.

As I got half way through, I felt that it was dragging a little bit and decided to start another book and finish it-then came back and finished this one. It was good, the narrator was excellent. Only issue was the writer kept breaking down the same thought processes-I found myself zoning out a bit. But I'm glad I finished it.

Compelling

In Torey Hayden’s seventh book TWILIGHT CHILDREN, she’s working as a child therapist with Cassandra, who had been abducted by her father for two years and experienced behavioral problems since returning to her mother. Drake, a charming four-year-old doesn’t speak, or even make a sound except to his mother.

Hayden also chose to include Gerda, a geriatric stroke patient who had difficulty speaking. I have no idea why Hayden included the story. She didn’t work with Gerda but volunteered to visit. Perhaps she didn’t have another interesting child to include in the book.

Torey works well within the system and understands the boundaries of her relationship to the patients, supervisors and team members. She’s clearly come a long way. I questioned some of her leading question techniques, particularly since abuse was suspected. Hayden acted as if her role was to determine what happened during the kidnapping, rather than help Cassandra learn self regulation skills to be released from the hospital. Healing from her abduction would take years. Hospitalizations are meant for acute psychiatric crises that can’t be managed outpatient.

I’m not sure why Hayden never contacted Mayo about Drake’s workup. Reports don’t show everything and having a conversation with a doctor can further understanding. The whole case was off and should have alerted her to HUGE red flags.

I admire Hayden’s dedication and determination to help her patients. She goes the extra mile and has apparently learned more appropriate boundaries than in her previous books.

TWILIGHT CHILDREN is an adequate, often compelling read for those interested in child psychology.

Chilling,

I enjoy all of Torey Hayden's biographies. Well written. Narration was good. The situations are sad but mostly has a satisfactory ending. The journey sometimes painful to the listener (reader), which I’m sure is exponentially worse for the children involved.

Great Information.

I enjoy the real life cases of all of these books. The only criticism I have is in 2 of the books the word indeed was used so much it started to become a distracting irritant to the point I have to take a break before reading another by this author.

Amazing story!!

What an amazing story. I love all of Torey Hayden's books. The narrator does an excellent job telling the stories in this book. Torey is an amazing individual and that really comes out here. I highly recommend this book and any of her others.