Bücher von Rex Ogle

In his award-winning memoir Free Lunch, Rex Ogle's abuela features as a source of love and support. In this companion-in-verse, Rex captures and celebrates the powerful presence a woman he could always count on-to give him warm hugs and ear kisses, to teach him precious words in Spanish, to bring him to the library where he could take out as many books as he wanted, and to offer safety when darkness closed in. Throughout a coming of age marked by violence and dysfunction, Abuela's red-brick house in Abilene, Texas, offered Rex the possibility of home, and Abuela herself the possibility for a better life. Abuela, Don't Forget Me is a lyrical portrait of the transformative and towering woman who believed in Rex even when he didn't yet know how to believe in himself.

Punching Bag is the compelling true story of a high school career defined by poverty and punctuated by outbreaks of domestic abuse. Rex Ogle, who brilliantly mapped his experience of hunger in Free Lunch, here describes his struggle to survive; reflects on his complex, often paradoxical relationship with his passionate, fierce mother; and charts the trajectory of his stepfather's anger. Hovering over Rex's story is the talismanic presence of his unborn baby sister.Through it all, Rex threads moments of grace and humour that act as beacons of light in the darkness. Compulsively readable, beautifully crafted and authentically told, Punching Bag is a remarkable memoir about one teenager's cycle of violence, blame and attempts to forgive his parents-and himself.

Rex Ogle's story of starting Year 7 on the free lunch programme is timely, heart-breaking and true.