Dave Pelzer is a contemporary American non-fiction writer. He has produced numerous books of autobiographical nature and most of them qualify as self-help books. His 1995 memoir, A Child Called “It”, based on his childhood abuse, is marked as one of his key works.
Born on December 29, 1960 in San Francisco, California, he was given the name David James Pelzer at his birth. He was the second-born among five siblings and was raised in the Daly City by his parents Catherine Roerva Christen and Stephen Joseph Pelzer. As a young child Pelzer was consistently abused by his alcoholic and mentally deranged mother. The severity of the abuse almost took Pelzer’s life on several occasions. It was not until he turned twelve that his teacher stepped in and placed him in a foster care. Social services deemed Pelzer’s abuse the most horrendous and gruesome of all such cases reported by that time in California.
Pelzer was relocated to numerous foster homes before he enlisted himself in the U.S. Air Force at the age of 18. Two years later he got married and had a son, though his marriage fell apart a few years later. He provided his services in the Gulf War as a fighter pilot. He earned the title of California Volunteer of the Year as he received the JC Penney Golden Rule Award in 1990. By that time, Dave transformed into a highly accomplished person, earning numerous prestigious titles and awards. In addition to that, he was commended by the Presidents of USA.
He penned his first book in 1995, titled A Child Called “It” in which he narrates his personal account of abused childhood. According to him, his mother tortured him in every possible way, physically, emotionally and mentally from age 4 to 12. His father remained deliberately negligent of the entire situation as he was an alcoholic himself. His brother Richard B. Pelzer also details his experience in the abusive household in his, A Brother’s Journey.
Dave Pelzer explains his purpose of writing his memoir as to address the prevailing issue of child abuse. He highlighted the fact that no matter how detrimental the effect of childhood abuse might be, if one truly wills to improve his situation and achieve a better life, one does eventually. The book received positive reviews upon its release and remained at the top spot on New York Times Bestseller List for several years. The secret behind its instant success was that most of his audience could relate to the subject. However, some critics remained skeptical of the memories that Pelzer so accurately incorporated in his book. Moreover, critics had seen the timing of the publication of the books, just after his parents’ death, to be highly convenient, given the story would never check out. Another critic pointed out the fact that there was not enough evidence to authenticate Pelzer’s account. In fact, his own maternal grandmother and brother had questioned the validity of his memoirs.
Subsequent to publishing his first book, in 1997 Pelzer wrote his teenage memoir, titled The Lost Boy: A Foster Child’s Search for the Love of a Family. The third book published, A Man Named Dave: A Story of Triumph and Forgiveness (2000), details his life as an adult and how he finally made peace with himself as he learned to forgive his father. Attaining success as a writer, he began to write self-help books. Some of these works include Help Yourself (2001), The Privilege of Youth (2004) and Moving Forward (2009).