This book is a passionate cry from the heart. From the heart of someone who has given almost everything she has to the cause of justice and happiness for heavily-abused children and for HIV/AIDS sufferers, and from the heart of the real, here-and-now, South Africa - no pretence, no frills, exactly as it is, with supporting evidence. The people are all real people, with their real names; the incompetence, the neglect of duty, the corruption, the malevolence, the despair - and the goodness, the tenderness, the devotion to a cause, the trust and the joy - are all real. Writing the book has been an extremely draining and highly emotional experience, and this inevitably shows through in much of the text. But it had to be written, because the terrible failings of the 'system' have to be exposed, because the author needed the catharsis, and above all because the lives - and deaths - of these deeply hurt but irresistible children needed to be recorded and remembered. Here there is little for your comfort and much cause for the beloved country to cry.