Lucia Nevai, Salvation

Lucia Nevai, Salvation. Crane and her siblings were born in a squatter's shack to the alcoholic trio of a hooker, a lunatic, and a pool-hustler/failed revival evangelist and were starved and left to fend for themselves for a decade or so. Crane was eventually adopted by a sweet childless couple and renamed Princess (she learned to read and became a talented young scientist). I was never quite able to suspend my disbelief and really enter into the story, fun as it was. Perhaps if it had been set anywhere other than Iowa - who could believe the neighbors minded their own business for eleven years?