This book exposes a provocative true story of triumph over tragedy. It provides a powerful account of a mother’s courage and spiritual strength during a life fraught with an incredible succession of misfortunes, trauma, and death. The story focuses on Robert Thompson, the eighth of ten children. During the morning of Christmas Eve, 1977, fourteen-year-old Robert was roughhousing with two younger brothers while awaiting the call for breakfast. Moments before their mother made that call, Robert became upset and left the house, never to be seen or heard from again. He was the subject of a massive search that ended in shock and horror when his skeletal remains were discovered in the chimney of an abandoned halfway house a few blocks from the family home. Not only does this story reveal the power of the human spirit, it also challenges our own inner strength and philosophy of life.
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Russell W. Moore was born and raised in the South Los Angeles community of Watts, which is infamously recognized as the flash point of catastrophic riots in 1955 that spearheaded an era of civil and racial uprisings of proportions never before seen in America. An only child, much of his formative years were spent under the roof and guidance of his maternal grandparents while his parents worked at night.Mr. Moore was educated in the Los Angeles Unified School District and graduated from John C. Fremont High, where he loved participating in sports--not as an athlete, but as a writer/reporter for the sports section of his school and the metropolitan newspaper. His work at the Scholastic Sports Association (SSA), a component of the former Los Angeles Herald Examiner, was rewarded with a scholarship to Pepperdine University (formerly Pepperdine College in 1962). In 1969, he was among a select group of seven aspiring journalists chosen to the Fall Fellowship Program at the Washington Journalism Center in Washington D.C. Competition was nationwide.Unable to connect with a network that was genuinely dedicated to abandoning the racial barriers that still existed in the late 1960's, Mr. Moore found the challenges and opportunities to have a positive impact on the lives of troubled youth highly rewarding from the authoritative role of a Probation Officer.A year after joining the Probation Department, Russell entered graduate studies at USC's School of Public Administration, earning an MPA in 1973. Mr. Moore spent 15 years as a Supervisor before retiring in 2003, after 33 years of public service. Mr. Moore is married with three adult children. This book marks his entry into his new career as an author.
