Synopsis "A Cancer Called Abuse"
After publishing the first book, My Roman Soldier (ISBN 9781477605936), in 2013, I believed that I was finished articulating the sexual abuse my daughter endured by her biological father and his-my then husband-emotional abuse of me. However, shortly after distribution of the book began, I recognized that there was much more to be told about Lauren's journey... and mine. My Roman Soldier, written under pen name Hannah Alden, described the discovery of abuse and corresponding sequence of events that forever changed our lives. This book, A Cancer Called Abuse, demonstrates how good has come from those dark days. I use a pen name because, after trying to work with a printing house (for the first book), there were challenges producing a book that is nonfictional in nature while using my own name. Hannah Alden has significance to me. I do, however, use Lauren's first name since, in the United States, nearly one quarter of a million people are named Lauren, making it less traceable, and... because that is her name. This book is dedicated to those individuals who have had personal experience with any form of abuse-physical, sexual, emotional, mental, financial-and are in varying stages of surviving... and thriving from such encounters. Abuse, like enduring a cancer diagnosis, changes a person... no argument there. The real question is whether you allow yourself to be changed for the better, or for the worse. With God's help, I have been transformed into a new person.
