From the publisher’s description: “This book gets at the root causes of trafficking — what leads up to it — instead of focusing on a survivor story or how to help those already in it. The focus is to help adults — parents, coaches, teachers, counselors, or even someone at the grocery store — recognize signs of abuse or vulnerability — and how to do something about it. How we can all intervene.” This book truly focuses on proactive prevention and is well-tailored to the intended readers: parents and professionals.

If you have children, know people who have children, have family members who are children, work with children, want to protect children, or were a child yourself at one time… you should read this book. While it’s not written as a memoir, the author uses her personal experience to educate readers about the “link between sex trafficking, child abuse and domestic violence.” Readers have praised this book for being truly trauma-informed as the title suggests. The author avoids descriptions and language that could be triggering for survivors of trafficking and/or sexual abuse. 

As a survivor of abuse and trafficking herself, Savannah Sanders is a leading advocate in the prevention of child sex trafficking. She regularly speaks to groups across the U.S. about anti-trafficking efforts and support for survivors using her own experience as a cornerstone of her advocacy.

Migrant Crossings is another book that brings an interdisciplinary lens to the human trafficking crisis. It examines the experiences of Asian and Latinx migrants trafficked in the United States, particularly in the context of informal economies and service industries. 

Berkeley professor Evelyn Nakano Glenn said, “Migrant Crossings brilliantly dissects our understandings of the plight of Latina and Asian women trafficked into informal economies of sex and service. Combining original analysis of court cases, news accounts, and police reports with the author’s experience as a volunteer counselor, Fukushima reveals a legal system that requires a survivor’s story to fit the model of ‘perfect victimhood’ in order to cross into visibility and be deemed worthy of asylum.

Those seeking to understand how human trafficking happens across borders and the circumstances that lead to human trafficking in the context of service industries will find this book eye-opening. It challenges readers to question how they understand victimhood, criminality, citizenship, and legality.

Annie Fukushima, Ph.D. is a scholar, an activist, and the Associate Dean of Undergraduate Studies and Director of the Office of Undergraduate Research at the University of Utah. She also serves as Associate Professor in the Division of Ethnic Studies with the university’s School for Cultural and Social Transformation.

This deeply honest and authentic memoir details Megan Conner’s journey out of the abusive systems that dominated her life since childhood. It is hopeful without shying away from difficult topics like toxic family patterns and cult mentalities.

The publisher’s description reads, “Nobody wants to believe that the relationship, family, corporation, or religion they are involved in is an abusive system. That’s why it can be particularly difficult to identify these systems in our lives, and even more difficult to leave them.”

This book is part memoir, part survival guide. It was written as a “beacon of hope to those who feel stuck and don’t know how to leave.” It’s ideal for those looking for insights into coercive and abusive relationships and systems, especially as they relate to modern-day slavery.

Megan Connor is a mother of 6 and an executive at a fuel supply company. She survived sex trafficking as a child, and today she is dedicated to educating others on how they can recognize and leave coercive and abusive relationships and systems.

This is a powerful memoir about a human trafficking survivor who killed her captor and was unjustly sentenced to life in prison without parole when she was just sixteen years old. The story is raw and devastating, but it ultimately leads to Kruzan’s pardon and release many years later.

This is an examination of all the adults who failed a child and how that child grew up to not only fight for herself, but to fight for others who have been exploited and abused as well.

Reviewers often describe this book as difficult to read, but inspiring and important. Its fast-paced narrative style will appeal to readers who tend to favor novels over nonfiction. Please be aware, it contains graphic descriptions of abuse, especially in the first half of the book. Some readers may wish to use caution.

Cori Thomas is an author and playwright in New York City.

Sara Kruzan now advocates for the rights of women and children facing incarceration. In 2021, she inspired Sara’s Law in California, a bill proposed to prevent juveniles from being sentenced to life in prison for committing violent acts against individuals who traffic, abuse, and assault them. The bill was referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security in October 2021, and unfortunately, has seen no further progress since.

Patricia McCormick’s book, Sold, sheds light on the global human trafficking crisis and how economic desperation can lead to unthinkable circumstances, especially for children. 

Lakshmi is thirteen years old and lives in a small hut with her family on a mountain in Nepal. When a monsoon leaves her family’s farm in ruins, her stepfather tells Lakshmi that she must leave her home to work in the city so she can support her family. The job seems promising at first, but Lakshmi soon learns that she won’t be a maid — instead, she was sold into sex trafficking. 

Although this story of survival and triumph is, at times, difficult to read, the award-winning novel has earned its rightful place in the literary canon and in the world of human trafficking activism and intervention.

This book is appropriate for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of human trafficking globally. Sold is a young adult novel, later adapted to film, with a target age group of 14 to 17. The author takes great care in the language she uses and avoids graphic descriptions, but because the book contains rape and sexual assault, it may not be suitable for all readers.

Patricia McCormick studied journalism at Columbia and meticulously researches her books. As part of her research for Sold, McCarthy traveled to Nepal and India and interviewed women in Calcutta’s red-light district as well as girls who have been liberated from modern-day slavery.