This memoir is told as a narrative in first person. Set in the late 40's and early 50's, this story is of Jennings Michael Burch's life as an orphan.
Jennings is taken to an orphanage called Home of the Angels by his alcoholic mother. She leaves him and reassures him that she will return, but instead, she abandons him. There he meets two other orphans, Stacy, and Mark. The Sisters of the orphanage are either warm with him or cold, but all are nurturing compared to Mrs. Burch, his mother.
Some foster parents adopt him called the Carpenters. They make money by adopting him and by his being their dependent, but they are violent and they beat him, so he ends up in the orphanage again. After some time he is transferred to a new orphanage. By his third or fourth orphanage, he realizes the situation is dire, and he escapes and lives at the Bronx Zoo. He is discovered quickly and is shipped off to a new foster family. Randomly, his mother contacts him. She wants him back at the house now, so suddenly, he is back with his mother.
He reflects on the jarring, sudden changes in his life, the random uprooting and transferring to a new home, never quite establishing a sense for what is normal. In essays, he discusses self-esteem, self-acceptance, and the damage done to his psyche by his mother. After some time there, she is injured in an accident, and Jennings is sent back to an orphanage. He is taken in by Sal, the bus driver. In an epilogue, he describes his decision to become a police officer to give back in some way.
