overview about the book

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Pelzer was the third born of five children. His father was a fireman and, according to Dave, his mother was originally a loving, kind and wonderful person who would try to do anything for her family. The abuse gradually started when he was about five. At that point, Dave could tell what kind of day he could expect to have by the way his mother was dressed. If she was all made up then he could expect a good day, but if she wasn't he knew he would be hit, yelled at, punished, or all three.
The book describes the worsening abuse that Pelzer suffered at the hand of his mother and her alcoholism. Most speculate that she had some other addiction or a chemical imbalance but none is known. The abuse escalated when Dave was seven years of age when he was told he would stay back in first grade for another year. It's not made clear whether the school or his mother made this decision. At this point he began to be punished severely, made to do extra chores, and was banned from family activities. The beatings began to increase and now began to happen with his father around as well. The "good days" were becoming few and far between. That summer he was excluded in a family vacation. At first he tried to stop the abuse but as time went on felt unable to intervene.
The next year the abuse intensified and at that point he was not even allowed to eat meals with the family. That Christmas, Dave's mother showed him a letter she claimed that came from North Pole. It stated that Dave was a bad boy and would get no toys for Christmas. That Christmas David found only a couple books for him. A few months later, his mother attempted to burn Dave on a stove when he was 8 years old. Abuse increased even more after that. By the time he was in second grade at 8 years old, his mother began to make him go without food for extended periods of time. The abuse gets worse and David is forced to sleep in the basement and perform even harder labor. He got an average of half a meal a day on a good day. When David was 10, she also stabbed him in the stomach "accidentally", as Pelzer notes in the book—and did not take him to the hospital (though she did take care of the wound herself). By this point he was no longer considered part of the family and lived in the basement, denied basic contact, play, and food. His mother stated that she did not want Dave to interact with "her family".
Over time the depth of the abuse worsened. Dave claimed he was forced to sit in the "prisoner of war" position (head bent backwards facing sky, sitting on hands). His mother stopped using his name and began referring to him first as "The Boy" and finally "It". The punishments are reported to have evolved into "sick games" in which she made her son suffer.
Incidents cited in the book include forcing ammonia down his throat, sitting in a sealed bathroom while inhaling the fumes from a bucket of ammonia mixed with bleach (Gas Chamber), inducing vomiting followed by forced ingestion, smashing his face against a mirror while forcing him to say "I'm a bad boy", lying in the bathtub naked with freezing water for hours, rubbing his face in his baby brother's soiled diaper, trying to make him eat his youngest brother's feces, as well as starvation and general malnutrition, and "accidentally" stabbing him with a knife when he didn't meet the time limit to do the dishes. His mother also put his hand on a gas stove which caused his hand to burn to crisp. She also said, "Now sit on the stove so I can watch you burn and die."
In each of the sequels, the author reveals more forms of torture he did not describe in this book (e.g., his mother hitting his neck with a broom handle, causing his neck to swell so that he was unable to breathe).
David generally only got food when his father was home, for example. In the face of this abuse, his father gradually distanced himself from the house, and finally moved out days after David turned 12 years old. About two months later, on March 5th, 1973 David was rescued by teachers at his school.