Includes material on "genocide survivors, witnesses to their own parents' murders, children raised in closets and cages, and victims of family violence ... explains what happens to the brain when a child is exposed to extreme stress, and the author reveals how today's innovative treatments are helping ease children's pain, allowing them to become healthy adults.

Only since the 1990s have researchers and health officials known about the alarmingly high prevalence of childhood trauma, and the harm it can cause. Trauma during childhood has been associated with numerous mental disorders and physical illnesses among children, adolescents, and adults, and a growing number of experts are calling it a public health crisis. The prevalence of childhood trauma is covered, as is how it affects children and adolescents,...

"Ro is stuck. She's just entered her thirties, she's estranged from her mother, and her boyfriend has just left her to join a mission to Mars. Her days are spent dragging herself to her menial job at a mall aquarium, and her nights are spent drinking sharktinis (mountain dew and copious amounts of gin, plus a hint of jalapeno). With her best friend pulling away to focus on her upcoming wedding, Ro's only companion is Dolores, a giant Pacific octopus...

"A deep examination of what happens after life-altering events, from car accidents to incarceration, and how we forge new identities when our lives are cleaved irrevocably into a before and after "What doesn't kill us makes us stronger," the saying goes. But does it really? Tracing the lives of six people who have experienced catastrophic, life-changing events, journalist Mike Mariani explores the nuances of what happens after one's life is cleaved...

"When Henry was a child, something terrible happened in the woods behind his home, something so shocking he could only express his grief by drawing pictures of what he had witnessed. Eventually, Henry's mind blocked out the bad memories, but he continued to draw, often at night by the light of the moon. Twenty years later, Henry makes his living by painting his disturbing works of art. He loves his wife and son, and life couldn't be better...except...