A foster child's story about a life against the odds

A foster child's story about a life against the odds

This is what 7-year-old Andrew Bridge thought as the police took him from his mentally ill mother on a Saturday afternoon on the streets of Los Angeles. Torn between the desire to protect his beloved mother and the need to be safe, he was pulled away from her and into a life that proved only marginally more bearable than his harrowing existence with her. Andy was taken to MacLaren Hall, public orphanage, "death house of childhoods," as he writes, and then placed with an emotionally and often physically abusive foster family in the San Fernando Valley, northwest of downtown, where he stayed for 11 years. And yet, "Hope's Boy," published last month and reaching No. 6 on the New York Times best-seller list, is not an abuse book. The man I sit talking with 38 years later radiates happiness, excitement, health. He carries a picture of his mom on his iPhone. Bridge looks boyish, although not at all like the boy sporting an odd, blank, half-smiling stare on the book's cover. When he's particularly thrilled with a topic, he literally hops up and down, even when seated. "This is not a book about me," he insists. "It is a book about my mother."