by John Glatt
First published 2010
In August 2009, registered sex offender Phillip Garrido walks onto the UC Berkeley campus with two young women. Their strange behavior catches the attention of campus officials and police. This encounter leads to a discovery that stuns the nation. Garrido has held Jaycee Lee Dugard prisoner for eighteen years in a backyard outbuilding in Antioch, California, just two hours from her childhood home. During her captivity, Jaycee lived in complete isolation while Garrido repeatedly assaulted her and fathered two daughters with her. The revelation of her survival brings relief across America, but raises troubling questions about how authorities failed to detect her presence for nearly two decades. Glatt examines how Jaycee endured years of abuse and confinement, transforming from the girl next door into a survivor whose story reveals both human resilience and systemic failures.
Genres: biography, abuse, crime, non-fiction
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Antioch, California, UC Berkeley
Period: 2009
352 pages · Kindle Edition · St. Martin's True Crime
Content warnings: kidnapping, sexual-assault