Little Peach

by Peggy Kern

When Michelle runs away from her drug-addicted mother, she has just enough money to make it to New York City, where she hopes to move in with a friend. But once she arrives at the bustling Port Authority, she is confronted with the terrifying truth: she is alone and out of options. Then she meets Devon, a good-looking, well-dressed guy who emerges from the crowd armed with a kind smile, a place for her to stay, and eyes that seem to understand exactly how she feels. But Devon is not what he seems to be, and soon Michelle finds herself engulfed in the world of child prostitution where he becomes her Daddy and she his Little Peach. It is a world of impossible choices, where the line between love and abuse, captor and savior, is blurred beyond recognition. This hauntingly vivid story illustrates the human spirit s indomitable search for home, and one girl s struggle to survive.

Michelle runs away from her drug-addicted mother to New York City and finds herself engulfed in the world of child prostitution. The plot contains profanity, sexual references, and descriptions of physical abuse and sexual violence.

• ISBN10: 0062266950
• ISBN13: 9780062266958
• Publish Date: 10 March 2015
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Imprint: Collins
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 208
• Language: English

Reviews

[shannonmiz]

Before I get into the actual book, I have to give huge kudos to Peggy Kern for penning this book. This is one hell of a brave book to write. There won't be people who are just dying for a reread of Little Peach. This isn't happy, or uplifting, or anything other than downright horrifying. But it is brave. And more than that, it is important, because the worst part of the whole thing is that this stuff happens. And after reading this book, it is so clear how and why, not that it makes a difference to girls like the main character Michelle.

So, this book broke my heart, mostly because of all the real girls that this happens to every day. I used to wonder how on earth someone could get messed up in this culture, but Peggy Kern answered that question for me and then some. Not only did it make sense how Michelle ended up there, it made sense to me that she ended up there. I mean, I was almost agreeing with her decisions, even though I knew logically (and from my own very different viewpoint) that they were wrong. She was in such dire straights that I almost hoped right along with her that things would work out okay, though I knew full well from the synopsis that it wouldn't be the case. (How ludacris would that book be- "Michelle meets bad man. But he isn't so bad and she lives happily ever after, the end"?)

Here's the downside to this book for me: I didn't connect to Michelle very much. But I think it would have been far worse if I had been able to really and deeply connect with her. I don't think I'd be able to read the story, to be honest. That slight disconnect is the only thing that really allows the reader to keep reading. Otherwise, it is simply too awful. Part of the disconnect is that I think Michelle is disconnected from herself, in a preservation attempt, so we are only getting the surface of who she really is. Maybe she doesn't even know. It would be hard to know who you are in the vile world she's had to live in.

Bottom Line: I did not like this book. I don't think one does like this book. Because how can you, really? All you want to do when it is over is drive to your nearest city and start rescuing girls at bus stops and such. And maybe cry for a few hours, and lose all faith in humanity. BUT- that doesn't matter. It is so incredibly important to read this (and to be sure to read the author's note!) that "liking it" doesn't even matter. Little Peach matters, because girls living in these situations matter, even if they don't think that's true, even if most of society doesn't think it's true. By the time you are finished reading this book you will know it's true. They matter. 
This review was originally posted on It Starts at Midnight

[Ashley]

This book was really different. It was a crazy story that left me thinking A LOT when I was finished. But at the same time, the book never felt that intense or gripping—I think because of how it was written. Although it got my mind running wild with thoughts immediately after finishing, I fear that I will also forget this book fairly quickly. It didn't stick with me very well.

The writing style isn't exactly "traditional". It's very abrupt, with sentences like:

I saw this.
This happened.
That's there.
He's looking at me.
I can feel him.
Now it's over.

It wasn't bad, it just made it difficult for me to really get into the story and feel like I was part of it. It lacked a certain depth, which is what normally would hook me in.

Still a good book, I just wish it could have been a bit more.

[Amber]

This is such a difficult book to review because I feel like nothing I say is going to do it justice. I’m going to keep this short, because I don’t think I need to ramble on about unimportant things.

Little Peach is a powerful, horrifying, and heart breaking read that tells a story of child prostitution and human trafficking in the USA. It focuses on one girl in particular, Michelle, after she runs away from home and ends up in NYC, but there is also a small cast of other characters.

The story is absolutely incredible, despite being extremely disturbing, because it sheds a lot of light on things that many people, Americans included, like to cover up. People like to pretend that child prostitution and human trafficking isn’t a thing that happens in the good ol’ US of A. They pretend they’re things that happen in third world countries, far removed from their white picket fences. But Peggy Kern is challenging that with Little Peach and bringing it to the light.

I would 100% recommend reading Little Peach, even though it’s going to be a difficult read for many, many people. I think it’s important to raise awareness and to open eyes to the things that are happening so close to your own doorsteps.

[Leah]

After having a really rough time with books recently – and by rough, I mean books that are very, very serious I put a shout out on twitter asking for a light hearted read… Then I dived into my kindle and had a look at some of my new releases and started reading Little Peach, by Peggy Kern. Lemme tell you, it’s the hardest of all the books I’ve read recently, and it packs a bloody punch.

Little Peach is one of the shortest books I’ve read in ages – taking me just over an hour, but it’s heavy duty stuff. I’ve never read a book about teen prostitution before, and it’s sort of left me wide-eyed and terribly frightened for anyone suffering as Michelle did. And Kat. And Baby. It’s scary. It made me sick to my stomach when Baby said she was only 12 years old. Yuck. Just, yuck. I wanted to stop reading, almost as much as I didn’t want to stop reading.

What I liked is that Peggy Kern doesn’t sugarcoat stuff. The novel is upfront and honest, and dives right into the heart of the matter. Wham, bam, thank you, ma’am. I rather appreciated the pace of the novel and the fact there’s no blathering and that Michelle is hardly old enough to know what Devon is doing to her, and so her narration is sickly sweet, and to the point. There’s no time for her to reconsider, because there’s nowhere else she can go – she only ended up in New York because her mom didn’t want her in Philly. No wonder she saw Devon as a safe haven!

It’s one of those novels that just leaves you a bit speechless, a bit flabbergasted. It’s hard to say I enjoyed it, but I did. I liked how we saw Michelle in the present, all beaten and broken, but determined to help herself if the lady with the card can help her, and then we flash back to how Michelle got into that predicament in the first place. It’s completely harrowing, and the authors note at the back doesn’t help at all, because sadly there are true stories about the Michelle’s, Kat’s and Baby’s of this world. It makes me want to weep forever, and ever and I applaud Peggy for writing such a brutal, honest novel. Little Peach is astounding, a must read for everyone, despite it’s horrific nature.