Simon Cambridge

I am originally from England but moved to Los Angeles in 1997 and then subsequently to the beautiful Emerald City of Seattle in the Pacific Northwest - an area I have now made home and developed roots in.

The Cankered Rose and Esther's Revenge is the first of three books covering the decision of my wife, Esther, and I to adopt Cordelia, a severely traumatized girl from the Washington State foster-care system. Cordelia arrived with reactive attachment disorder trauma and a host of other "special needs" that sadly prevented any form of secure or lasting attachment to either my wife or myself. Esther proved unwilling to help me to break the cycle of acceptance and rejection and so my wife and I separated in 2008 with Esther moving back to Los Angeles.

My first book covers the dramatic circumstances of my daughter's removal to be with her adoptive mother in Los Angeles. My second and third books will then cover the unresponsive nature of the child-welfare legal complex in the City of Angels and my intense legal struggle to reunify with my daughter after a dependency case was initiated to try to break the parent-child bond. We shall be looking at the prejudicial nature of child welfare and how the entire system is callous to motivated parents and unresponsive to the real needs of children who find themselves in foster homes or residential treatment facilities. My own struggles with Asperger's syndrome and its quest for the truth will be contrasted with my daughter's quest to be right.

I find writing to be therapeutic and engaging and my wish as a writer has been to produce a series of books on adopting an older child with special needs that are, and which will continue to be, part memoir and part instructional in nature, connecting both the prosaic and the passionate. As matters unfolded with respect to my adoption and near total loss of Cordelia readers will see the balance between the two guides ever shift and become effective and ineffective.

When I am not writing and worrying about my daughter, I can be found in my therapist's office, taking in wonderful productions of the Seattle Shakespeare Company, or watching my beloved Seattle Sounders FC at CenturyLink Field in Seattle.