Further Reading for Victims/Survivors & Facilitators

The titles included in this section have been chosen for their value in encouraging a wider understanding of the issues and experiences of victims, survivors, advocates, offenders, law enforcement and corrections professionals, and victim service providers in general. These books call attention to the wide and complex range of aspects that can arise for survivors, or arise with offenders. These issues matter not only to survivors, but to facilitators involved in the complex preparation process for victim offender dialogues in crimes of severe violence.

Not many survivors, offenders, or facilitators would make the time to read all of the books in these lists, but just making ourselves aware of the issues they explore will add to our understanding of the dimensions of this work. Survivors may find their experiences affirmed, and offenders may learn something about their choices and behaviors that they had not previously understood. VOD facilitators will surely broaden their understandings. For some, the titles alone may help raise awareness by implying new questions, which makes the list itself worth patient perusal. And although VOD facilitators are not therapists, per se, our preparation work very often ends up being “therapeutic” in its own way. For this reason, a few books written for trained therapists are also included here, as the experiences, insights, and understandings of those practitioners can be relevant to some of the preparation work that facilitators do with both victims/survivors and offenders.

The book summaries included have been gleaned or copied from publishers’ descriptions, contents pages, or library catalogs. If you are a professional in the field and believe we should consider including one or more titles that are missing from our lists, we’d be grateful to hear from you.

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