Ghosts of the Orphanage: A Story of Mysterious Deaths, a Conspiracy of Silence, and a Search for Justice

"Sometimes the world's secrets have to wait for the right person to turn up to reveal them. Across ten years of hard and painful investigation, Christine Kenneally discovered, explored, and here reports on a great sink of human misery visited upon unprotected children by the very people who were honored for caring for them. It's a chilling book, but a brave and important one--and a gripping read. It bears comparison to Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago."--Richard Rhodes, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb and A Hole in the World
"In the orphanages Kenneally investigates, sanctimonious, seemingly pious adults physically, emotionally, and sexually abused children, imagining that the children exposed to their shameful barbarism would forget the 'morally upright' adults' horrific crimes. A cautionary tale about the long-term impact of adults' cruelty to children--how perpetrators' brutality, even when half-forgotten--nonetheless haunts victims with bodily pain, mysterious fears, and eventually, maybe, powerful understanding."--Jessica Stern, senior fellow, Harvard School of Public Health
"Kenneally has pulled off an astonishing feat in Ghosts of the Orphanage. She has produced a haunting, literary page-turner that is also a work of deep and urgent reportage. The reporting is tenacious and jaw dropping, but it is the characters who will stay with you long after the book is done."--Jessica Garrison, author of The Devil's Harvest
"Kenneally... paints a beyond disturbing picture of human cruelty in this shocking exposé of decades of abuse of children housed in orphanages across multiple countries in much of the 20th century...This harrowing true crime story is essential, if deeply difficult, reading." --Publishers Weekly, starred review
"A powerful work of sociological investigation and literary journalism." --Kirkus Reviews
"The history of orphanages in the 19th and 20th centuries is secretive, dark, and vast. ...Kenneally handles each person's story with great care and ensures that this time, the people who were failed by the system are heard... An important look into the dark past of orphanages globally. It's also a deep dive into the ways these horrific stories were kept out of the public eye for so long."--Library Journal, starred review
"Even after Spotlight, even after Tuam, this book was a shock. Christine Kenneally's exposé of the abuse and torture of children in 20th-century orphanages fits neatly alongside those earlier stories of religious institutional child abuse. And yet, readers might find themselves emotionally unprepared...Kenneally is a diligent, patient reporter... But over 10 years of reporting, Kenneally chips away at the secrets, finding documentation and corroboration. The reportage in this book is impeccable. She never says more than she can prove, but she also never says less. The stories were true....'Ghosts of the Orphanage' is a damning book, from start to finish."--Minneapolis Star Tribune
"A gripping chronicle of the ways in which those in power ignored, or even encouraged, the ill-treatment of children across borders, cultures, and decades." --The New Yorker
"It is a measure of [Kenneally's] nous as a journalist, as well as her patience and persistence, that she uncovered as much information and testimony as she has in what by all accounts is an extraordinarily difficult area to investigate." --Sydney Morning Herald