Free Cyntoia

My Search for Redemption in the American Prison System

Cyntoia Brown-Long

• Publisher: Atria Books
• Year: 2019
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Print ISBN:
  9781982141110
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• eBook ISBN:
  9781982141127
• Index: Social Sciences

NAACP Image Award nominee for Outstanding Biography/Autobiography

In her own words, Cyntoia Brown-Long shares the riveting and redemptive story of how she changed her life for the better while in prison, finding hope through faith after a traumatic adolescence of drug addiction, rape, and sex trafficking led to a murder conviction.

“Those...years in prison hadn’t just turned me into woman. They transformed me. The girl who desperately wanted to belong, who felt powerless, who clawed, and scratched her way out of every corner she was backed into, was gone.”

At the age of sixteen, Cyntoia Brown, a survivor of human trafficking, was arrested for killing a man who had picked her up for sex. Two years later, she was sentenced to life in prison.

Brown reflects on the isolation, low self-esteem, and sense of alienation that drove her straight into the hands of a predator. Once in prison, she attempts to build a positive path and honor the values her beloved adoptive mother, Ellenette, taught her, but Cyntoia succumbs to harmful influences that drive her to a cycle of progress and setbacks. Then, a fateful meeting with a prison educator turned mentor offers Cyntoia the opportunity to make the pivotal decision to strive for a better future, even if she’s never freed.

In these pages, Cyntoia shares the details of her transformation, including a profound encounter with God, an unlikely romance, an unprecedented outpouring of support from social media advocates and A-list celebrities, and her release from prison. A coming-of-age memoir set against the shocking backdrop of a life behind bars, Free Cyntoia takes you on a spiritual journey as Cyntoia struggles to overcome a lifetime of feeling ostracized and abandoned by society.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Introduction
• Chapter 1. The View from the Outside
• Chapter 2. Tales of a Displaced Princess
• Chapter 3. Longing for a Happy Ending
• Chapter 4 Trying for Normal
• Chapter 5. Going for Grown
• Chapter 6. Damaged
• Chapter 7. Powerless
• Chapter 8. Self-Defense
• Chapter 9. Trapped in a Cage
• Chapter 10. Facing Life
• Chapter 11. Spared
• Chapter 12. Fighting for My Life
• Chapter 13. Two Paths
• Chapter 14. Self-Destruction
• Chapter 15. Proving My Worth
• Chapter 16. The Hands and Feet of Christ
• Chapter 17. “The Chick in the Box”
• Chapter 18. Memphis
• Chapter 19. Finding My Way Home
• Chapter 20. Burned Letters from Texas
• Chapter 21. Last Resort
• Chapter 22. Going Viral
• Chapter 23. Asking for Mercy
• Chapter 24. Finding Home
• Epilogue
• Photographs
• Acknowledgments
• About the Authors
• Copyright