The book · 2005
Invisible Children
The book that explains why KARA exists. Drawing on Mike Tikkanen’s years as a CASA volunteer guardian ad litem in Hennepin County, Invisible Children takes an uncomfortably close look at the American cycle of abuse — and the children caught inside it.
The paperback is ordered direct from KARA, so the whole $16.95 funds the work.
Mike Tikkanen · 2005
The story behind the work
The children behind the statistics.
Invisible Children tells the stories behind the statistics this site now tracks — the children the system does not see, and the systems that fail them.
Mike Tikkanen drew on his years as a CASA volunteer guardian ad litem in Hennepin County to write it. What he witnessed became a firsthand account of how abuse moves through families, institutions and generations — and what happens when the people responsible for protecting children fail to see them.
Published in 2005, two years before KARA received its 501(c)(3) certification, it remains the foundation of this work.
An uncomfortably close look at the American cycle of abuse and its cost.
Mike Tikkanen · Invisible Children
Why it still matters
A book from 2005. A problem that hasn’t disappeared.
Invisible Children puts human stories behind the numbers. It shows what can happen when children disappear inside systems meant to protect them — and why seeing those children is the first step toward changing what happens next.
KARA’s work today grows from the same conviction that shaped this book: children at risk should not become invisible.
Get the book
Start with the story.
Read it, listen to it, or keep a copy. However you take the book, you are helping make the work possible.
The work continues
Start with the book. Help with the work.
Read the stories. Listen to the voices. Then look at what KARA is doing today for children at risk.