gogowhatwhat's review against another edition
2.0
The first half of this book was good, then it just got to be a big pity party. The end turned out to be pretty lame. I had read Homes' article in the New Yorker which is basically the beginning of this book, and really that was the only good part.
sarahcoller's review against another edition
4.0
I'm really surprised by how much I related to this memoir---like scarily so. I received this in a BookCrossing bookbox and dismissed it several times before deciding to give it a try. Weirdly, it was almost calling out to me to read it. I'm so glad I did---I devoured it in one afternoon. It didn't really solve or fix anything for me...just got me thinking and contemplating about my past and family stuff that I don't process through as much as I should.
Homes's memoir brings to mind so many thoughts on identity and the gut-born desire to be truly known. This passage resonated with me:
"I grew up convinced that every family was better than mine...I would hover on the edge, knowing that however much they include you--invite you to dinner, take you on family trips--you are never official, you are always the 'friend', the first one left behind."
That's exactly how I felt after my parents' divorce---the unwanted stepkid on both sides. Both parents tried to make me a part of their twisted new "family units" but I was already a part of only one family unit---the one they'd divided.
I was not adopted but I relate to so much of this story. We have in common the messed up desire to please lousy parents---to perform and hope they'll find us good enough to let into the selfish world they shut us out of. (My mom is a much different person now than she was in the years just after her divorce and she's an important part of my life now.) I don't often think back on the hard years but this story reminded me of that vulnerable girl who was looking to be loved and cared for by those who couldn't get past themselves to do it properly.
I thought of my dad when the author said after hearing her mother was sick, "I was so busy protecting myself from her that I didn't...(recognize) the trouble she was in." It's a messed up world when this is the relationship one has with her parent(s).
Cleaning up the home after her mother's death she says, "This is not how (she) would have wanted to have been presented---but this is who she is and what she left behind." This makes me think of my dad's mom who was estranged from us until the last few years of her life. This is how I felt after her death and I wondered if I was the only one in the whole world who even semi-mourned her. I mourned the "could have been" rather than the "was".
So there you go...a look into my guts. Probably won't see another one for awhile. Maybe I need to go back to the Aunt Dimitys...
Homes's memoir brings to mind so many thoughts on identity and the gut-born desire to be truly known. This passage resonated with me:
"I grew up convinced that every family was better than mine...I would hover on the edge, knowing that however much they include you--invite you to dinner, take you on family trips--you are never official, you are always the 'friend', the first one left behind."
That's exactly how I felt after my parents' divorce---the unwanted stepkid on both sides. Both parents tried to make me a part of their twisted new "family units" but I was already a part of only one family unit---the one they'd divided.
I was not adopted but I relate to so much of this story. We have in common the messed up desire to please lousy parents---to perform and hope they'll find us good enough to let into the selfish world they shut us out of. (My mom is a much different person now than she was in the years just after her divorce and she's an important part of my life now.) I don't often think back on the hard years but this story reminded me of that vulnerable girl who was looking to be loved and cared for by those who couldn't get past themselves to do it properly.
I thought of my dad when the author said after hearing her mother was sick, "I was so busy protecting myself from her that I didn't...(recognize) the trouble she was in." It's a messed up world when this is the relationship one has with her parent(s).
Cleaning up the home after her mother's death she says, "This is not how (she) would have wanted to have been presented---but this is who she is and what she left behind." This makes me think of my dad's mom who was estranged from us until the last few years of her life. This is how I felt after her death and I wondered if I was the only one in the whole world who even semi-mourned her. I mourned the "could have been" rather than the "was".
So there you go...a look into my guts. Probably won't see another one for awhile. Maybe I need to go back to the Aunt Dimitys...
sarsch's review against another edition
5.0
I have so many passages underlined in this book. As an adoptee myself it is refreshing to read another adoptees direct take on adoption. More often than not the adoption narrative serves the adoptive parents needs not the adoptee. I highly recommend this book to all adoptees and the people in their life wanting to hold space for them.
julkatt's review against another edition
3.0
Still working through how I feel about this one. While generally a sucker for a memoir, this one left me feeling a little embarrassed and creepily voyeuristic... I guess I wish Homes had handled the discussion and portrayal of her birth parents a little more gently; with just a bit more compassion...whether or not it was deserved. A 2 1/2 star effort.
nursenell's review against another edition
4.0
A good book by an adopted adult whose birth parents searched and found her. It's different from other stories of search and reunion because she was not the person who initiated the process. Interestingly, being found leads her eventually to getting involved with doing the genealogy of both her birth and adoptive families.
ccmhats's review against another edition
5.0
One of the best adoptee memoirs I’ve ever read. Direct writing about the sideways, upside-down, life-changing turmoil of adoption reunion, as well as the complicated feelings of what it’s like to be an adopted person, of two families, yet not truly belonging to either.
I marked over 200 passages in this 238 page book, feeling seen & understood (as a fellow adoptee who has also been reunited/rejected) at every point.
I could not recommend this book more!
I marked over 200 passages in this 238 page book, feeling seen & understood (as a fellow adoptee who has also been reunited/rejected) at every point.
I could not recommend this book more!
pema66's review against another edition
5.0
I have read many books on the adoptive experience, having a vested interest in it myself. The fact that this one is by a professional writer makes it positively zing along. I was interested in what she said which was different from other adoptees but also what she said which was exactly the same. I enjoyed how she structured the book so it told the stories of both her birth and adoptive families in a narrative, like characters, then delves off into " who do you think you are?" geneaology then there is a sort of a revenge on her arse of a birth father and finally she reaches a sort of autologous settlement in which she acknowledges that she has both biological and social resonances echoing through her. The last chapter where a walnut table plays a great part and she sees her much loved adoptive grandmother in her own daughter made me cry, then smile. I will cherish this book and return to it many times.