Adoption Book Reviews

adoption stories and books

A Birthmothers Life March 23, 2016

Adoption Stories and Books- Birthmother Memoirs to Adoptee Information

While everyone seems to love an adoption story; whether it be adoption horror stories or adoption reunion stories, adoption success stories  or adoption stories gone wrong – these seem to capture the interest of the general public who want to peek into our lives like adoption voyeurs. However, not all books about adoption are stories about adoption. Though the adoption memoir has a place, there are many more informational books about adoption that should also be well known and on everyone’s books shelves.

A Relevant Adoption Book List

There are many MORE books about “how to adopt a child” or even “adoption books for kids”; those will NOT be my primary focus, but some will be included here even if only to even out the lists and also for SEO purposes. I’m going to do my best here to break adoption books down via categories.  Obviously some books will be relevant across the board and serve to meet more than one need.  The books that I HAVE read myself will be so noted, but obviously I have not read them all.

Mirah Riben on Huffington Post, More Adoption Blogs from Adoption Bloggers September 22, 2015

The Intercountry Adoption Debate

By Mirah Riben What is the debate concerning international child adoption? That depends on who you ask. Forty-four experts representing a variety of disciplines including law, medicine and health, social work, anthropology, religion, sociology and history have their say inThe Intercountry Adoption Debate, edited by Robert L. Ballard, Naomi H. Goodno, Robert F. Cochran and Jay A. Millbrandt.     The formidable 737-page, hard cover volume contains twenty-seven essays in…

Mirah Riben on Huffington Post, More Adoption Blogs from Adoption Bloggers August 10, 2015

Losing a Child to Adoption Leaves a Hole in the Heart

By Mirah Riben Lorraine Dusky is an accomplished journalist and author. She has made a career of writing, a career which led her to meeting the father of her daughter. It is also a career which contributed to her feeling the need to hide the shame of her “out of wedlock” 1960s pregnancy and then to hide the evidence born of that illicit affair by placing her daughter for adoption….

Mirah Riben on Huffington Post, More Adoption Blogs from Adoption Bloggers July 24, 2015

Adoption Creates a “Split at the Root”

By Mirah Riben In every conceivable manner, the family is link to our past, bridge to our future. Alex Haley I am not a fan, in general, of adoption memoirs perhaps because I have read too may. Most are elongated, detailed blog posts. Split at the Root: a memoir of love and lost identity stands head and shoulders above the run-of-the-mill adoption memoir. If Oprah was still on their air,…

“Hole in My Heart” Lorraine Dusky

A Birthmothers Life June 18, 2015

 “Hole in My Heart” Lorraine Dusky’s New Adoption Memoir

“Hole in My Heart” isn’t light reading, but it is compelling and necessary. Perhaps it is best described as s strong dose of medicine; a strong antidote to adoption mythology, and a injection of raw honesty wrapped up in a riveting story of a life uncommon to most, much like a spoonful of sugar. The truth goes down smooth leaving needed ethical questions emerging as an aftertaste.

Costs of Adoption, Mirah Riben on Huffington Post, More Adoption Blogs from Adoption Bloggers June 15, 2015

Voices From AdoptionLand

By Mirah Riben “I feel like a stolen heart from a corpse, trapped in a foreign body.” Sunny Jo “This is not something that gets better over time. Because as you get older, as you live, you learn more and more about what’s been taken away from you. And you learn more and more about the enormity of what’s been stolen.” Cameron Horn “I feel like a ghost, invisible to…

kate mulgrew memoir born with teeth adoption

A Birthmothers Life April 20, 2015

Kate Mulgrew Comes Out as a Birthmother

I have to say quite clearly; Birthmother and actress Kate Mulgrew’s new memoir “Born with Teeth” is NOT an adoption book. It’s really a memoir of an actress who is a birthmother. The adoption story part of it is very true to the experience and very real, very raw and one will find themselves totally “getting it”. There just isn’t nearly as much “adoption” as one might think based on the press coverage. Like she really goes into way more and, in some ways much deeper and better, with the interviews. Granted she does write about the relinquishment, but after that, until the VERY end, it’s more of an undercurrent of sorts that doesn’t really get addressed all that much, but referred to in passing. If you are looking for birthmother validation, then you might be disappointed.

More Adoption Blogs from Adoption Bloggers, Surviving Adopted March 31, 2015

The Paradox of Adoption Grief

By Laura Marie Scoggins It has been 15 years since I found out my birth mother died of breast cancer. My story had a lot of twists and turns until two years later I was able to walk into the office of Catholic Charities and obtain her true identity. How those events unfolded and why it took so long is a long story. Search, reunion and even the post reunion…

More Adoption Blogs from Adoption Bloggers March 13, 2015

Finding Family Truths and Roots

By Mirah Riben Review of the book, Finding Our Families: The first-of-its-kind for donor-conceived people and their families by Wendy Kramer and Naomi Cahn, J.D. Finding Our Families is a treasure trove of compassionate advice designed to help those raising the more than an estimated million people who were conceived using so-called donor* sperm, the tens of thousands whose lives began with eggs of contributors, and thousands who were “adopted”…

Denise Emanuel Clemen's memoir "Birth Mother"

Relinquishment September 23, 2014

Adoption Book Review: “Birth Mother” by Denise Emanuel Clemen

What I love the most about Denise Emanuel Clemen’s memoir “Birth Mother” is that it is ONLY the pregnancy and immediate adoption experience that she tells. Just as the reader has so many unanswered questions and wonders, the birthmother is left always wondering about her child and the child is left wondering about the mother. It is that complete separation that makes this story so powerful.

Mothers, Mothering and Motherhood; Across Cultural Differences; A Reader:

A Birthmothers Life, Community July 17, 2014

The Highs and Lows of The Birthmother Chapter

Whats More Evil? The word “Birthmother” or the fights caused over it? So, while I hate, hate, hate, the adoption terminology wars and refuse to participate in them, I’m going to break my rules because I also hate, hate, hate assumptions and all the rest too. And since I was literally forced to deal with this today, rather than just enjoying the printed thrills of having my book come in the mail, I’m going to go there.

The Child Catchers

Adoption News, Adoption Truth, Cultural Views on Adoption, Rants and Raves June 2, 2013

The Child Catchers- Rescue, Trafficking and the New Gospel of Adoption

It was with great anticipation that I waited for The Child Catchers. Sadly, while we can all blog, and self publish, and get memoirs going, the “non biased” pen of the non adoption affected if often needed to bring the anecdotal facts home for the general public. It’s like they can’t believe “us”, probably because they do not want to, and dismiss it as “your experience” believing us “too close” to see the full picture. Making Kathryn’s eyes, her words, like balm on the ever oozing wound.
The Child Catchers- Rescue, Trafficking and the New Gospel of Adoption is a must read, must have on any adoption bookshelf.

Community, Rants and Raves, Searches November 13, 2012

The Fifth and Final Name by Rhonda Noonan

When the end is reached, you will not doubt the validity of her claims, for she has inherited the DNA strain that was so obvious in her famous grandfather Sir Winston Churchill, yes THAT Churchill, the British Prime Minister; she never, never, never, gave up. While Rhonda wins out in the end, The Fifth and Final Name illustrates the injustice in the closed record system while providing a strong primer of adoption truth and adoptee understanding that the non adoption affected can understand.