A Beautiful Child: A True Story of Hope, Horror, and an Enduring Human Spirit

Rating:
Summary: A beacon in the fight to end child abuse
Review:

I applaud Matt Birkbeck for writing A Beautiful Child. Coincidentally,I began working with neglected and abused children during the writing of this book. The writing is simple and straightforward but the actual plot is quite complex.

A Beautiful Child is a true story that leaves the reader wanting to do something about abuse or help in finding missing persons. It's the kind of book you put down after reading and find yourself staring out the window for a long time. You wonder why nobody ever said anything before it was too late. Sharon Marshall could be anyone's neighbor or high school buddy; she was the girl next door, a shining example of hope for a better world. Earning top grades, listed in Who's Who Among American High Schools, Sharon read Shakespeare for enjoyment and participated in ROTC. She was headed for Georgia Tech on a scholarship, with the goal of someday working for NASA. The sweet, blonde girl with the cheery disposition would never see that dream. Neither would her little son, Michael. There's more, much more.
This is a tale of baffling sadness and gross cruelty that spans generations. Warren Marshall, aka Franklin Floyd kidnapped a child, raised her as his daughter, then as his wife and mother of his child. His activities left hardened detectives appalled and searching for the answers to a mystery that remains yet unsolved.



Rating:
Summary: "Beautiful Insight" to a Beautiful Child
Review: "Beautiful Insight" to a Beautiful Child

Aside from my own personal experience with the Tent Girl, never have I felt so close to knowing the person behind the mystery. A Beautiful Child allows the reader to experience the mystery as it unfolds and changes direction as it did in real life. This book is a wonderful gift that I will treasure. A masterpiece that I see it as a true story of hope that provides the testiment that fuels the compassion it takes to work these types of cases on a daily basis. It re-ignited my own personal passion.

More accurate in terms....TWO beautiful children are outlined in this book...

A Jane Doe buried with no true identity known....and her STILL missing son who never had a true identity, other than a knock off of an alias. This book just might be their BEST HOPE of eventual resolution.

Todd Matthews
DoeNetwork &
Outpost For Hope

Rating:
Summary: Astonishing
Review: A great book is one that leaves you thinking long after the last page is read. It's been a week since I read A Beautiful Child, and it's all I think about. I have seen words like "incredible" and "unbelievable" used to describe this work. I would add "sobering" and "miraculous". Sobering in that a young girl could be kidnapped in this country by a vicious murderer and actually raised as his daughter with nary a whisper from anyone. Miraculous in that Matt Birkbeck brought this young woman to life. We see her laugh, we see her cry, we see her battle the evil she was unwillingly forced to deal with. This is a book that defines a writer's career, a book to be remembered by. Mr. Birkbeck's simple yet riveting prose is purposely understated as it only can be to tell such a story so rich in imagery. A Beautiful Child is a gift, a book that must be read by every parent, teacher, social worker, police officer - by anyone - if only to remind us of the evil that lurks, and that goodness can shine so brightly even in a remarkable young woman who was thrust into hell.

Rating:
Summary: A Compelling Book
Review: For those who are interested in true crime, it doesn't get anymore chilling than this. A Beautiful Child, by Matt Birkbeck, is the true story of a young woman known to many as Sharon Marshall. Sharon's story is one of absolute horror, but also one of the indomitable human spirit.

Matt Birkbeck begins his book with Sharon's death. The story of Sharon Marshall is revealed through the aftermath of her death. Birkbeck follows the path of how investigators first became involved in Sharon's story, learned who Sharon was and wasn't, and how the search for Sharon's past continues to this day.

A Beautiful Child is a good book. It is not the best written book, but its subject matter is absolutly compelling. I did not want to put this book down. The book looks at Sharon Marshall's life from several different primary sources, the people who knew Sharon as well as anyone did. The book is also loaded with first hand accounts of the people who investigated Sharon's life, who she was and where she came from. And finally, the book is very timely and up to date. Information about the investigation at the end of the book is only few months old at the most at the time the book was published.

A Beautiful Child by Matt Birkbeck is worth reading. Its a chilling look into the life of a young woman who never gave up. Its a story of despair but also of hope. Its the story of a beautiful child, a story that needs to be told.

Rating:
Summary: Remarkable Story
Review: I commend Mr. Birkbeck for writing this book. It's hard to believe this story is real, but it is.

I am amazed that this is not national news. This story grabbed at my heart. It's tragic & gut wrenching - you won't be able to put down. Mr. Birkbeck has done a remarkable job bringing Sharon to life, showing that through all her pain & suffering, she was equally beautiful & highly intelligent.

This book will be in my heart forever. You will not be disappointed reading this story. I can only hope it inpires you as much as it has inspired me. Thank you Mr Birkbeck, for bringing this Sharon's tragic journey to the forefront. I can only hope there is closure to her identity.

Sharon also had a son, who is missing, named Michael Hughes. Her kidnapper also kidnapped her little boy. Michael has never been located.


Rating:
Summary: Compelling story; awful book
Review: This book is very poorly written, and contains numerous factual errors, according to individuals with firsthand knowledge of some of the information purported in the book. I found myself shocked that a "journalist" did not give attribution throughout the book regarding his sources, and apparently did not do much fact checking.

It is true that the story is compelling and horrifying, no question. It is a shame that the story was not written better or told more accurately.

By the way, per the title: where is the hope or enduring human spirit in this tale? Sharon was a stripper and a prostitute and ended up dead at an early age.

Rating:
Summary: Utterly compelling, fascinating.
Review: You cry, you cringe, you get angry, you cry again. With each passing page I found myself immersed in A Beautiful Child.
Is it a mystery? A tragic tale? A sorry history lesson? It's all three and more. This is a book that you not only won't put down, but will read again and again and as my first Amazon review, I want to tell the world about this book.
Like other reviewers, I applaud Matt Birkbeck for writing this book. How can you not? Investigative journalists flesh out the truth, and at the same time they paint a bulls eye on their back for their enemies to aim. Birkbeck is no different. After reading A Beautiful Child I read his first book on Robert Durst, A Deadly Secret: The Strange Disappearance of Kathie Durst. It's another gripping book, one that takes apart the sleezy criminal justice system and lets a serial killer remain on the streets.
I don't believe Birkbeck is a crusader more than he is an obvioulsy talented writer who found great stories, reported on them, and presented them in such a way that leaves your head spinning. Most importantly he remains true to the facts and above all he can relate a story. Of the two A Beautiful Child is the better story. A young girl kidnapped by a monster and raised as his daughter, at the same time she maintains their secret and accomplishes great things in school? This must be fiction, but is not. A Beautiful Child is a book that MUST be read, discussed, disected and understood, if only to save another Sharon Marshall.