I read Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver as part of M. Judson’s 2023 Reading Challenge (a re-telling of a classic). Demon Copperhead is a very loose re-telling of David Copperfield. Demon (Damon) is a child who ends up in foster care after his mom dies of an overdose. His step-father is abusive, so he did not want to live with him (nor did his step-father want him). Damon goes through different types of foster placements, none of them ideal (to say the least). It is an eye-opening look at the foster care system in America. It’s like a train-wreck- you can’t stop reading. I don’t say that to mean anything against the book- quite the opposite. Like all of Kingsolver’s books, it is masterfully written. The content is just hard. I found myself thinking about my students in the foster care system and praying their situation is nothing like Damon’s.

I then decided to read Foster the Family by Jamie C. Finn, which had been waiting in my Kindle library for awhile. This ended up being the perfect follow-up to Demon Copperhead, and got me thinking about how we as a family can support foster parents. We can’t personally foster right now due to my daughter’s cancer treatment, but we can support others who are fostering. Our county has an organization that delivers home-cooked meals to families who are fostering, so I am looking into this (my daughter, and dog, love drive-through errands to get out of the house). The local organization also has a resource closet of clothes and school supplies, and provides a duffel bag with some of these things for new placements. If you are interested in foster care (whether you can foster or not), I would encourage you to read both of these books!

Age Recommendation:

I don’t think Demon Copperhead is appropriate for middle or high school students, but Foster the Family is, and may be especially helpful for older bio kids to read with their parent(s).

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.