Place of Hope will welcome Regina Calcaterra, best-selling author and New York attorney, to share her harrowing childhood, surviving the foster care system and homelessness, as part of Human Trafficking Awareness Month.

At a special appearance in Delray Beach, Calcaterra will speak on her New York Times best-selling memoirs, Etched in Sand, and recall how she and her four siblings persevered an abusive and painful experience in the shadows of Manhattan and the Hamptons.

Place of Hope, the county’s largest children’s organization, works to provide safe and nurturing homes for Florida’s foster youth. Calcaterra’s story and triumphant professional and educational success speak directly to its mission of caring for the next generation of leaders, who find themselves without their families, due to abuse, neglect or abandonment.

“We work with children who, unfortunately, are without the stable, loving homes that they deserve,” said Place of Hope Founding Executive Director Charles Bender. “Amazing women like Ms. Calcaterra illustrate what the community can do for youth who might otherwise be lost in the system or on the streets. Caring individuals can lend their talents to support the next attorney, doctor or author.”

Presented by Merrill Lynch’s The Miller Wachtler Group, Calcaterra’s engagement, will be held at 11 a.m. on Thursday, January 12, 2017, at Seagate Country Club, 3600 Hamlet Drive, Delray Beach, FL 33445. Ticket price is $75. To order tickets, visit www.placeofhoperinker.org/events

 

Calcaterra’s memoir, Etched in Sand appeared on the New York Times Best Sellers lists for 16 weeks during 2013-14, rising to #2 on the New York Times and Wall Street Journal’s Non-Fiction E-Books Best Sellers list and #6 on the New York Times Non-Fiction Combined Print & E-Books list.

 

In 2015, for the third year in a row, Etched in Sand returned to the New York Times Best Seller and Wall Street Journal’s list for the 17th week, appearing again at #2 on the Non-Fiction E-Books list and #10 on the Non-Fiction Combined Print & Ebooks list (August 2015).

 

The book also was been selected for One College/One Book Read and integrated into college, high school and middle school curriculums. Her next book, Girl Unbroken, about her youngest sister Rosie’s journey, was released in October 2016.

 

By relating her own childhood experiences, Calcaterra powerfully provides audiences with insight into how simple acts of encouragement and kindness can forever impact the life of a child in need. She compassionately reinforces that no child is a lost cause, and that the power of resilience and optimism can pull anyone through the toughest of times. By emphasizing the importance of education and self-confidence, she reminds us that, regardless of social status, there are enough resources available to rise above one’s circumstances.

 

For the past 28 years, she has spent her policy, managerial and legal career in both the private and public sector. She is now practicing law as a partner in the New York office of Wolf, Haldenstein, Adler, Freeman & Herz.

ABOUT PLACE OF HOPE

Impacting lives in Palm Beach, Broward, Martin, St. Lucie, Okeechobee and Indian River counties, Place of Hope is a faith-based, state-licensed children’s organization. It provides family-style foster care (emergency and long-term); family outreach and intervention; maternity care; safety for domestic minor sexually trafficked victims; transitional housing and support services; foster care recruitment and support; hope and healing opportunities for children and families who have been traumatized by abuse and neglect. Place of Hope’s main campus is located at 9078 Isaiah Lane in Palm Beach Gardens. For more information, please call 561-775-7195 or visit online at www.placeofhope.com