Firefly

Thirteen-year-old Firefly lives in a park across the street from her mother’s home when she is discovered by a social worker and removed from her mother’s care. Placed with her aunt, she goes to school and makes friends but suffers from PTSD and disassociation from living with a mother who struggles with substance abuse and has subjected Firefly to physical abuse, neglect, and parentification. This engaging Canadian work, suitable as a read-aloud, literature circle, or novel study for secondary classrooms, can launch discussions about sensitive issues of child abuse and neglect, homelessness, mental health, substance abuse, and kinship and foster care.