Leaving Lila

Leaving Lila is the true story of Baker’s escape from “The Home.” With his meager possessions stuffed into a Boy Scout knapsack, Baker lived by wits and determination, on the road in search of his mother and a better life.

Baker skillfully crafts a memoir that is moving, suspenseful, and sometimes shocking. From the rare perspective of a ninety-year-old who experienced America’s underbelly in the 1940s, Leaving Lila is a firsthand account of a frightened boy who escaped horror only to find more trouble. But along the way, he also found love in encounters so intense they were indelibly imprinted upon his memory.