Trafficked – Kim Purcell
America is the land of the free, right? Not if you’re part
of the human trafficking trade that exists here.
From the moment Hannah arrives in America, though, she knows
she should’ve listened to Katya. Before boarding her international flight, the
agent who obtained her false documents forces her to show her thanks by
performing a sexual act on him. Further, he warns her that if she doesn’t do just
as the family asks of her, she might be turned over to American authorities and
jailed or, worse, passed off to someone else who may decide to use her for
sexual purposes. After an intimidating interrogation at LAX, the customs
officials at the airport eventually wave her through, though they seem to be
aware she’s in America under false pretenses. Rattled and scared, she arrives at
the home of the family she will be working for only to discover her
job will be different than originally described.
Though the father of the household, Sergey, seems nice
enough, his wife Lillian makes clear to Hannah that SHE is the head of
household and Hannah will do her bidding. Hannah is to be up and have breakfast
ready for everyone by 7 every morning; she is responsible for cleaning the
entire house everyday; she is to tend to their two children, Maggie and
Michael, and only speak in Russian to them, since it’s their native language and
Lillian doesn’t want them to forget it; she is never to be alone with Sergey and
when speaking to him, she is NOT to look him in the eye but instead stare at
the floor; she is never to leave the house alone or make phone calls; and though
they have a beautiful, spacious home with additional rooms, she is to sleep on
a cot in the corner of their closed-in garage. Sounds like fun, huh? As if the
drudgery of her job doesn’t sound bad enough, Hannah learns she won’t be paid
since she ‘owes’ them $4,000 in fees they paid to bring her to America, and she
won’t possibly have time to attend English classes or go to school since she has
a full day working with them – basically 6am to 11pm.
With time, things only get worse for Hannah as Lillian -
already insecure and threatened by her - grows more jealous and irrational. She
even becomes physical a time or two and hits Hannah. On the flipside, Sergey
shows her some compassion and, on occasion, will slip her some money, but his
niceness comes with a price - unwelcomed sexual advances. Then there’s the
family friend, Paavo, who offers to take Hannah off the Platanovs’ hands if she
becomes too difficult to manage– y’see, he
has brothels that need girls like her. When Hannah is cleaning one day and
discovers all her letters to home opened and stored in a draw by Lillian, who
was supposed to have mailed them, Hannah realizes she must somehow find a way
to escape. But what can a foreign girl with no contacts, no money and only
broken English do?!
Hannah’s story will break your heart – especially, when you
consider stories like this are real and happening right now here in America. Purcell’s
portrayal of Hannah’s everyday life of servitude from sun-up to sundown both
humbles and shames the reader at the everyday freedoms we take for granted. Moreover,
Purcell touches on the harsh loneliness Hannah feels trapped with this family –
she has no one at home to talk to and no one her own age in America to share
simple conversation with, which is why she daydreams about the teenage boy who
lives next door. In fact, the highlight of her entire day is hauling out the
trash at 11pm on the off-chance she might say ‘hello’ to the boy as he takes
out his family’s trash – his only
chore. As tough a subject as Trafficked
is, it’s a story that needs to be told and you won’t be able to put Hannah's story down.
To learn more about Purcell, you can visit her website at http://kimpurcell.com/home . As Purcell
states in her ‘Author’s Note,’ twenty percent of sales from this book will go
to help organizations that fight human trafficking.
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