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Hard Candy: Nobody Ever Flies Over the Cuckoo's Nest

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AS A VICTIM ADVOCATE AT A RAPE CRISIS CENTER, MYSELF AND TWO OTHER COUNSELORS COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN. WE ALL READ IT IN 3 DAYS TOTAL. I HAVE A SCHEDULED BOOK SIGNING WITH CHARLES AND I CAN'T WAIT FOR SOME QUESTIONS TO BE ANSWERED. WHAT AN INCREDIBLE SPIRIT HE AND HIS BROTHER HAVE. THE BETRAYAL OF THESE TWO MEN HAS LEFT ME IN AWE OF THEIR ACCOMPLISHMENTS.THIS BOOK IS A MUST READ AND I HOPE IT GETS NATIONAL RECOGNITION.CHARLES WOULD BE A WONDERFUL SPOKESMAN FOR CHILD ABUSE.

I could hardly take it! I had to put the book down to walk away from the intensity... but I'd circle right back in to sweat out the relentless string of nightmarish horrors tripping into and over each other. Though not without relief, the dark tones of this memoir ring in the colorless realities of Chuckie and Bobby, two orphaned brothers in dire need for the love of family and home. They were neither "insane," nor "retarded," but there they were, shuffled into the mix as such, foisting upon them the ravages of a dignity-stripping, state institution, archaically run, and fraught with stomach-turning abuse--sexual, physical, and psychological.

Throughout the story, told in a balance of narration and dialog, young Charles voices his experience; the lurid details of trust gone to betrayal, innocence thrust into vulgarity, dignity that compromises for protection, and yes, the occasional wisps of light and hope silhouetting relationships the "normal" outside world could never understand. This is Chuck's heart-rending, tell-all story of coping, courage, and survival. Deftly written and easy to follow, the story really moves, never once palling; the base line, flashbacks, and vignettes, each swapping in and out for center stage in perfect timing--artfully composed. Yet, the book's purpose is not merely of entertainment but one with a particular voice.

For the many children who have suffered the torrid abuse and neglect, "Hard Candy" speaks graphically on their behalf as part of today's vanguard to advance the call for protection of all those who are vulnerable to the crude indifference of those "in charge." The back of the book contains appendices, a hundred pages of evidence, documented citations of the very same miscarriages that happened to Chuck and Bobby that are still happening today.

After reading "Hard Candy" I felt so struck with an ever-deeper compassion for those who went defenseless, unprotected, and un-nurtured for all too long. And, I thought I had it understood, but this was humbling still. For the author, his memoir burns loudly through the pages, revealing the moral injustices, the personal indignities, and the pretentious facades that cover up and perpetuate the unconscionable. While credit is due for progress made, even today, there is still too much fueling the insanity fire. Inside "Hard Candy," young Chuck's truth glints and swirls; it rises up as tall plumes of smoke... and boy does the scent ever linger.


Highly recommended for anyone charged with the care of others.

This book is Charles Carroll's unflinching memoir of his and other boys' brutal treatment while wards of the state (New Jersey) during the 1950s. Mislabeled retarded and institutionalized, Mr. Carroll endured years of sexual, physical and emotional abuse at the hands of his caretakers and other boys. The book is well written with an adult insight into some of his experiences. Though definitely not a pleasant afternoon read, it is certainly a worthwhile one. He also includes an extensive appendix with examples of modern day abuses of the system; just in case you might want to solace yourself with the thought that things have been fixed in modern day society.

HARD CANDY: Nobody Ever Flies over the Cuckoo's Nest, should be sitting on the desk of every governor, senator, representative, director, and educator, and all students and professionals in human and social services, psychology and public health as ready reference to the complete failure of state mental institutions that maintain they protect its children, and it should be in the hands of every parent worldwide, to be used as a textbook in the protection of their children from pedophilia and child abuse. HARD CANDY is a must read for anyone caring for the welfare of children.

Hard Candy is an unforgettable saga of a young boy and his determination to survive appalling odds in one of our nation's mental institutions, where living conditions were so sadistic, so brutal and degrading, that "child abuse" doesn't come close to describing its disgrace.

Mr. Carroll has devoted his life to the pursuit of knowledge and generating awareness about the abuses that still occur inside such institutions. Do not think that his is a tale of yesteryear, nor take for granted that we have fixed the problem, for Mr. Carroll states, "Such atrocities do exist today, only today they are better hidden."

The author, with ample evidence, makes a good case for immediate public and bureaucratic concern, as this story is told with the innocent clarity of a young child, yet interspersed with the accumulated knowledge and hindsight analysis of the adult. It is a true story that travels through a decade of the author's childhood, beginning when he was seven years old, at which time he was repeatedly abandoned by the system and lost to the tombs of a bureaucratic hell. And though he was perfectly normal, he was committed to a state mental institution for men and boys, "a nuthouse," and remained institutionalized even though the psychology department of that institution told officials of the boy's inappropriate placement.

The story relates in chilling detail the daily living horrors that he and his brother went through, how they were dumped with society's outcasts in a nightmarish hell of abuse, hunger, filth, punishment, neglect, unending loneliness, enduring patterns of outright brutality, and physical and sexual abuse - while, in true institutional form, state employees looked the other way. But Charles, the author-victim, had the will to endure, to protect his brother at any cost, to survive the awful conditions-not for himself, but to one day write this book for those still clamoring for justice, to bear witness against the unjust for today's children-the all but forgotten.
HARD CANDY is an extraordinary read-a wonderful story of human survival.

Read it. I highly recommend it.

The fastest growing shelf in the bookstore has to be true crime as memoir. Many authors came out this year with books that take on heinous crimes committed against children they knew. In Hard Candy: Nobody Ever Flies Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the author writes true crime as memoir from the victim's point of view. And the crimes committed against Charles Carroll were inflicted by the state.

Charles and his older brother were abandoned by their parents. In 1951, when their foster care placement failed, they were reclassified and institutionalized in a state mental hospital. Charles, a perfectly normal child, was locked up with the mad and retarded at the New Jersey State Colony for Boys. If you read this unforgettable book about his hellish American childhood, you can never, ever complain about your own, no matter how bad you think it was.

Charles Carroll begins the story on the day of his entry, and we curiously follow him as he is thrown out of the Twentieth Century"and discovers that the place where he will grow up is a "nuthouse."The sexual abuse and vicious emotional abuse begins on the day of his arrival. He remained there for nearly a decade.

The story Carroll tells will read like wild fiction to some readers. But I can attest that the Hell he describes is no exaggeration. My mother worked at state mental hospitals in Michigan in the 1980s and 1990s. I worked in private care, lasting all of three months. As an attorney, I represented several private psychiatric hospitals, orphanages, and child care facilities, public and private, in sex abuse and wrongful death cases. I learned what"positional asphyxia"can do to the body of a child, and how hard it is to find a resident who has wandered away before he freezes. Much of it I'm bound by privilege not to repeat. But I've seen enough to know that Carroll's story is true.

Carroll mentions that an employee of the Colony was once accused of scalding a resident in the shower, causing burns over 20% of his body. I once took a job at a group home with six"profoundly disabled"persons; they were all wheelchair-bound and unable to communicate. One of the residents, a 60-year-old woman, had huge, thick keloid scars from her neck to mid-calf. The scarring that ran down the entire front of her body required lotions every day. I remember the horrified feeling I had when I first showered her. She'd been severely scalded in a state hospital shower.

There was another resident where I worked whose mortifying sexual behavior could not be stopped. It was the product of prolonged sex abuse in a state institution. This woman was about fifty, and she would [...] in the open, legs akimbo. The staff was so embarrassed by it, but she would get angry if anyone tried to stop her.

So this story rings sadly true for me. After relaying his gut-wrenching, graphic account, Carroll also took the time in his book to share documents on abuses discovered in state institutions. In 100 pages of appendices, he highlights just a few abuses recently uncovered by government investigations, including thousands of resident injuries per year due to"altercations with peers"and intentional abuse and rape by staff. Websites for the abused, all state sites for registered sex offenders, and books of interest are also listed.

"It is my ultimate hope,"the author says, that my forthright portrayal of the events depicted in Hard Candy will cause all who experience this book to develop not only a better understanding of abuse and its side effects, but also more compassion for the victims." That, I hope, it does.

Charles Carrol is a master in his writing of his book "Hard Candy;Nobody Ever Flies Over the Cuckoo's Nest" I couldn't put it down and read it in a 24 hour period. I laughed at some of the irony and wit that came from himself and his brother as they met head on the horror of their existence...and I wept and I marveled how he and his beloved brother who shared the horror of being wrongly placed in an institution could live to tell. As a foster child advocate I am keenly aware of what is wrong many times when it comes to the handling of children in the child welfare system. Charles Carrolll captures the horror in his masterful writing and once you read this book trust me you will never be the same...

This book captivated me. It was eye opening. Mr. Carroll is masterful portraying pedophilia and child abuse and his own personal story. I was appalled by the multitude of transgressions Mr. Carroll and his brother experienced as young children. What further bothered me was the continued abuse of our youth today as depicted in Mr. Carroll's book. HARD CANDY is well written and is an important contribution to victims, professionals and parents worldwide having anything to do with caring for children. This is one book you'll never forget. It's an amazing story of the human spirit to survive horrific odds. It is my hope that as more people read this book, that it will aid at curtailing abuse wherever it may exist. Bravo Mr. Carroll!

"Hard Candy" is a true account that chronologically follows the abuse and neglect Charles A. Carroll suffered in a foster home and a mental institution for years. It is terribly graphic and sad and not for the faint-hearted.

This book is so brutally honest and real. It captivated me and had me glued for hours. The words are so raw and blunt that everything could be played in my head. "A Child Called It" is a bedtime story compared to the true gruesome imagery crafted into the novel by Charles A. Carroll.

You dont have to be a victim to understand this book. All you have to realize is that people were sick back then, and continue to be sick now.

Both this man and his story is incredible. :)

I too was a harshly abused child - verbally, physically, and just like the author, even sexually messed over by a Catholic priest. I testify, you don't come out the other end of all that unscared. Each child handles it differently depending on the amount and type of abuse they suffer, but they're still wounded in some way. I grew up filled with fears of living, fears of dying, and near zero self-esteem. I saw other people as more deserving of great things, mentally rewarding myself with the worst life has to offer - always in the background, never the lead. Carroll greatly describes his series of emotions, which I can, too closely, identify.

I do, however, fully oppose the sub-title - Nobody Ever Flies Over the Cuckoo's Nest. After I accepted Jesus Christ as my personal savior and later received the baptism of the Holy Spirit - which is the power to live for God - my life slowly but surely took a total, positive turn around. I'm not claiming to be perfect, no one is, but I'm certainly not that fearful creature I was. My self-esteem (not ego) is now blown through the roof and beyond. I now visualize my name up in lights, intending to leave a great mark on this planet before I'm done, all because of a now solid relationship with God. I forgive my caregivers, abusers, and the priest. I even forgive The Arch Diocese for not caring for the victims or their families defiled by their priests during those years, but that doesn't mean I won't write a tell-all book about it someday.

Author of Grandmother is Home to Stay

I can best describe reading this book as a VERY INTENSE experience. "Witnessing" the horrifying abuse that Charles, his brother and the other children endured was very nearly unbearable yet I could not stop reading. I kept waiting for things to be made right!
This book is masterfully written and tells a story that simply must be told. I noticed that one reviewer referred to all of the good and caring people working with children in "the system". I understand his need to point this out but, here is the thing: The good caregivers are not the problem - as long as even one caregiver abuses a child, someone has to speak out. Mr Carroll speaks for those without a voice. Bless him for doing so.