From the Back Cover: Meet the Overcomers!

Discover the charming, often amusing story of a family that moved from being overcome by hardship—to being overcomers through the grace of Jesus Christ.

Here is a warm, personal account of a couple whose three children faced serious health problems: one had cerebral palsy, and two suffered from hyperactivity.

Read how the family learned to lean on God to help them overcome and to open their hearts to three more children with special health problems.

Read the Wheelers’ story and be encouraged, entertained and inspired!

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Bonnie Wheeler was born in West Virginia, was raised in Kentucky and Florida, and has been a Californian since 1961.

About the Author: David Livianu is originally from Romania, now a proud U.S. citizen since 1986, living in New York City. He is a graduate of the Juilliard School of Music. Since 1990 he has been involved in helping Romania’s orphans. His latest project since Romania closed its doors on international adoptions in 2001, was to research and document the adoption laws and procedures for all 194 countries of the world. The goal: to make all the critical decision making information available to parents and adoption professionals ... thus reducing the exorbitant costs and the inordinate waiting time!

From the Publisher: Okay, Which One of You Took My Sanity?: A Fun Guide to Foster, Adoptive, and Other Kinds of Parenting is a humorous he-said/she-said breakdown of parenting strategies. Hilarious true-to-life stories reveal common threads between two families facing unique challenges and even more unique children. Together the stories encourage other parents to embrace change rather than “fix” family dynamics. Matt and Claudia, both adoptive parents, each exhibit distinctive parenting styles within their own adoptive families. Still, both apply the same principles to pilot the demands of special needs parenting. Fun and laughter might be the primary intention of this “Dr. Phil meets Erma Bombeck” concoction, but it ruptures with insightful parenting techniques. In between laughs, you might discover that there is something very profound about being a parent ... but probably not.

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About the Author: Claudia M. Fletcher, B.A., M.Ed., is an adoptive parent, along with her husband, Bart, of 12 children born between 1986 and 1998. She is also an adoption professional and a national adoption speaker who combines humor with years of experience to encourage, instruct, and entertain parents and professionals alike. She resides in Minnesota with her husband and some of the twelve children (the number of people living at home changes on a daily basis)!

Matthew W. Hoffman graduated with a B.A. in Sociology from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) and spent time working in special education classrooms and healthcare. He and his wife, Krista, were licensed foster parents in the Baltimore/Washington area specializing in therapeutic care for nearly a decade. Their book, Hattie’s Advocate, a story of special-needs parenting has remained an online bestseller under adoption, children with special needs, and family relationships categories.

From the Publisher: Adopting a child over the age of two can present unique challenges and opportunities, even for experienced parents. It is one thing to understand about adopting an older child and quite another to live with that child. This book presents both the author’s personal experiences after having adopted three children (ages nine to twelve) and the results of her research of over thirty families who adopted older children.

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About the Author: Grace Robinson of Fort Collins, Colorado, was a Middle School teacher for 20 years. In 1983 when she wanted a Middle School-aged child she would not have to give up in June, she adopted a twelve-year-old. In the next three years, she adopted a thirteen-year-old and a nine-year-old. Grace has been an active member of Family Resources, a private, non-profit agency specializing in older child adoption.

In this informative, spirited, personal account, Valeria Woods encourages Christians to open their homes to the experience of fostering children, and adoption. This book covers the process and details required, and gives prospective parents the emotional and faith-based structure for taking this important and powerful step. Providing a home for a homeless child is, by far, one of the greatest examples of Christian love. It is a true twenty-four hour a day mission! Valeria Woods lives in Memphis, Tennessee and has been an educator for twenty-one years. She brings her personal experience and perspective, as both a former foster child and foster parent to nineteen children over the years, to the inspired writing of this book.

From the Publisher: Mired in debt and on the run from a series of broken homes, about-to-be-divorced Debra Monroe pulls up in front of a tumbledown cabin outside a small Texas town. Its isolation—miles from her teaching job in a neighboring city—feels right. She buys the house and ultimately doubles its size as she waits for the call from the adoption agency to tell her she’s going to be a mom. Now in her forties, she is swept into the strange new world of single motherhood, complicated by the fact that she’s white and her daughter is black. As Monroe learns to deal with her daughter’s hair and to re-enter the dating scene, all the while coping with her own and her daughter’s major illnesses, they live under the magnified scrutiny of the small, conservative town. Confronting her past in order to make a better life for her daughter, Monroe rebuilds not only a half-ruined cabin in the woods but her sense of what it is that makes a sustainable family.

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About the Author: Debra Monroe lived in South Dakota, Wisconsin, Kansas, Utah, and North Carolina before moving to Texas in 1992. She is the author of four previous books, including two collections of stories, The Source of Trouble and A Wild, Cold State, and two novels, Newfangled and Shambles. Her books have been widely reviewed and have won many awards, including the Flannery O’Connor Award for Fiction, the John Gardner Fellowship, and The Violet Crown Award. Her books have appeared on “Best Ten” lists in Elle and Vanity Fair magazines and in Borders’ “Original Voices” series. She has published fiction and nonfiction in many journals and magazines. She teaches in the MFA program at Texas State University and lives in Austin, Texas.

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By the Same Author: Shambles (2004), among others.

From the Publisher: This book speaks with unique power and intimacy to the millions of people across North America who, directly or indirectly, have had their lives touched by the adoption process. Here are the moving stories, taken from actual case histories, of adoptees who have tried to uncover a hidden past; of birth parents discovered by sons or daughters they had given up for adoption years before; and of adoptive parents who must cope with feelings of rejection, jealousy and bewilderment.

From the “Author’s Note”: I decided to write this book on January 4, 1979, one week after my niece’s death, when I went to her home in Denver, Colorado, to pack up her personal belongings and ready the house for sale. I was prepared for a traumatic experience. What I found was tangible, overwhelming evidence of her love and concern for little David, her adopted son. I shall never forget the three days I spent in Joan’s home.

This book is an attempt to honor a promise to my dead niece. I took an oath that if I could not fulfill requests in her will and trust—and the courts have frustrated me at every turn in these matters—I would make every effort to locate her adopted son’s natural parents in the hope that they might have married each other, or that one of them might recognize David’s need and step forward to rescue the boy.

One Against the Storm is true. The people are real, their names unchanged. The documented incidents are examples of love, hate, greed, betrayal, discrimination, revenge that extends beyond the grave, legal chicanery, brutality, and perjury, judicial incompetence and dishonesty.

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Compiler’s Note: Flight attendant Joan Wheeler was one of eleven people killed when United Airlines flight 173 crash-landed six miles short of the runway at Portland International Airport on December 28, 1978.

From the Back Cover: This is a mother’s story of survival. It is no more and no less than any mother could have done under similar circumstances.

A child is born with such incredible medical problems and challenges, a whole community is brought to bear to help keep her alive and her family from crumbling under the terrible strain.

It speaks of strength, and the illusion of control.

One Brief Shining Moment is a testament to one small family, trying its best to stay together, body and soul, and surviving the worst. It is a heart breaking, gut wrenching story to read, but one that demonstrates the depth of love.

When one’s alternatives are limited, you gotta go with what you got; and this is going with what you got, at its best. A must read for any parent who has ever faced a medical challenge with a child, as it gives insights only another parent can appreciate.

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About the Author: Arlene Swirsky lives in Central Massachusetts with her husband Bruce, son Greg, two Yorkshire Terrorists and a cat. She has covered news for the Worcester Telegram and also written for The Exceptional Parent magazine.

From the Dust Jacket: Q: Isn’t it a rule that siblings should not be separated?

A: There are no absolute rules on the separation of siblings, but agencies do try very hard, in most cases, to see to it that they stay together. Unfortunately, few adoptive parents want to take on two children simultaneously. You should certainly be informed as to the existence of siblings, however, and given the opportunity to apply to adopt both children.

Finally here’s a book all parents can turn to with their questions about adoption. Presented in a straightforward, accessible format are all the answers about this complex subject for prospective parents, and perhaps eventually, for the child they adopt. Drawing on the latest available facts and figures from dozens of organizations and agencies, as well as speaking directly to parents and children from a variety of backgrounds and circumstances, this book covers both the legal and technical aspects of adoption, and the crucial emotional aspects as well.

From the moment they begin to consider the process of adoption, prospective parents face a variety of overwhelming issues, choices, and decisions. Now, thanks to this book, they will learn every facet of adoption, from what they can expect from “home studies,” to the red tape they may encounter when adopting a foreign orphan, to the difference between private and public agencies. A thorough discussion of the controversial Surrogate Mother alternative is also included, making The 125 Most Asked Questions About Adoption the most up-to-date primer of its kind. Of course, Paul Baldwin also presents answers to such emotionally fraught questions as the best way to tell children that they are adopted, and when it is best to do so. The concerns of adopted children are also addressed through discussions ranging from the search for a biological parent to what medical information an adopted child can expect to have access to, and the best way to respond to insensitive classmates.

The 125 Most Asked Questions About Adoption covers every aspect of the adoption process and will help adoptive parents and children alike understand the unique issues that will face them in the course of their lives.

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Paul Baldwin is an actor and singer who has recently turned his talents toward writing.

I would like to invite you on a journey. A journey “seeking peace.” Travel along with me as God’s “Life Plan” for me begins to unfold. We will see together how God sets His plan in motion. Let the story begin: It’s 1963, I am 15 years old. God saves my life. Not once, but twice! Find out how God returns me to the path that leads me to the woman I will marry. I will share with you about the beauty of adoption and the difficulties that can come with it. How I have come to realize there is no greater gift on earth, than the gift of a child. You will see how my faith and trust in the our Lord develops and grows over the years. You will also see how God has blessed my family and myself in so many ways. So, please join me on this journey of 50 years. I promise you will laugh, you will cry, you will feel compassion. I hope that in these few pages, you will discover the “peace you are seeking.” A, husband, a father, a friend in Christ.

Have you ever considered adopting a child? For many centuries, the word, “adoption,” has struck fear in the hearts of most adults. Fear not! Adoption can be one of the most fulfilling and joyful experiences of an adult’s life. Through One Million Babies, Gale Duran tells the story of how a precious baby boy named Jeb was rescued out of a hopeless situation through adoption into a loving family. Through Jeb’s story, Gale applies her own experience with adopting and raising her own grandson to help educate you about the joys, challenges, and process of adoption. In the story, you’ll meet the boy’s mother, Shawna, a hurting woman who searched for “love in all the wrong places.” She conceives an unwanted child, and gives birth to a baby boy. Just before Shawna abandons the baby, a compassionate and helpful woman named Lois intervenes and teaches Shawna about a better option: adoption. When Jeb is adopted by his loving family, you’ll find out what it is like inside a foster home for unwanted children. This book will help to open your eyes and your heart to the possibility of adopting a child, and you’ll feel more equipped to move forward in the process.

From the Publisher: The husband beats his young wife, who is pregnant with her second child. This results in the loss of her unborn baby and in the ability to have another child. Years after her divorce, she meets a wonderful man and falls in love and they marry. Although, her life is happy she longs for another child and prays for one. Will God deliver with a miracle for both the birth mother and for her? Though many complications arise, she takes a leap of faith and takes this journey that ultimately leads to her “One Miracle Under God.”

From the Dust Jacket: Augusten Burroughs called Kathy Harrison’s Another Place at the Table a “riveting and profoundly moving story of a hero, disguised as an everyday woman.” In One Small Boat, Harrison continues her narrative on foster care with the story of one little girl who arrived on her doorstep and challenged everything Harrison thought she knew about foster care and the children it seeks to shelter.

Daisy was five when she first entered Harrison’s bustling household. Mother of three children by birth, three by adoption, and a handful of foster kids always coming and going, Harrison had ten children under her roof at any given time. But Daisy was, in many ways, unique. Unlike the parents of most of Kathy’s foster kids, Daisy’s birth mother wasn’t poor, uneducated, or drug-addicted. She just could not take care of a child, and the effects of this abandonment on Daisy were heart-wrenching. Fear and anxiety marked her every move; she scarcely ate, she spun restlessly around the room, and she seemed to have a severe speech impediment. After two weeks in Kathy’s loving home, however, Daisy began to thrive.

An intimate portrait of foster care in America and of the children whose lives are forever shaped by it, One Small Boat considers whether a sense of home and belonging can ever be restored to children after they have been taken away. In this beautifully written book, Kathy Harrison describes the lessons she learned from Daisy, lessons about resilience after heartbreak, courage after fear, and the power of love to heal even the deepest wounds.

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About the Author: Kathy Harrison has been a foster parent to hundreds of children. In 1996 she and her husband were named Massachusetts Foster Parents of the Year, and in 2002 they received the prestigious Goldie Rogers Award. A member of the board of the National Foster Parent Association and the Massachusetts State Foster Parent Association, Harrison lives near Northampton, Massachusetts.

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By the Same Author: Another Place at the Table (2003).

From the Dust Jacket: “Blaine, I think this little girl is our baby.” Little did Kathy Yorgason realize those words would come to mean.

Charity Afton Yorgason was born without a brain. She had a brain stem, which operated her autonomic nervous system and allowed her lungs and heart to work. But, her foster parents were told, she would never use any of her senses, never experience joy or love, never feel pain or any other physical sensation. And then would most likely die before she was two years old. Blaine and Kathy’s response was simple: “If she needs a home, we’ll give happy to give it to her.”

So Charity was adopted by the Yorgason family, and the miracles began. This little girl who was never supposed to experience any more than a vegetative existence quickly refuted all the medical "evidence" and proved she was capable of a great many things. She could smile and laugh, she could hear, she could follow people with her eyes, she could recognize loved ones. Regrettably, she could also obviously feel pain, and her suffering at times was almost incomprehensible.

But the greatest of Charity’s attributes was the love that radiated from her smile and her eyes to touch the hearts of all who knew her. She literally and permanently changed lives for the better just by being alive.

This astounding, true account is expanded in this edition to cover all the years of Charity’s life, and includes many photographs. Her story is a stunning testimony of the power of the spirit, the love of God, and the purpose of mortality.

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About the Author: Blaine M. Yorgason is the author of more than fifty books, as well as numerous articles and short stories. His novel The Windwalker was produced as an award-winning movie; Chester, I Love You was filmed by Disney Productions as the made-for-television movie Thanksgiving Promise; and Charlie’s Monument has been an acclaimed musical production. He and his wife, Kathy, have seven children and eleven grandchildren.

From the Back Cover: More and more adoptions each year in the United States are involving either direct or indirect contact between birth and adoptive parents and their adopted children. The Open Adoption Experience helps all those considering this kind of adoption, as well as those already involved with an open adoption, to understand, negotiate, and nurture their relationship as it grows and changes along with the child.

Nationally recognized adoption experts Lois Ruskai Melina and Sharon Kaplan Roszia help demystify open adoption, describing with vivid examples all stages of the relationship—from the initial preparation for open adoption, to placement and the adjustments of the first year, through the challenges of adolescence. The Open Adoption Experience also offers a detailed discussion of the many advantages of open adoption as well as the common problems, helping adoptive and birth parents to know what to expect as the relationship unfolds and how other families have coped with the unexpected.

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About the Author: Lois Ruskai Melina is the author of Raising Adopted Children and Making Sense of Adoption and is the publisher of Adopted Child, an international newsletter on adoption. She lectures across the country and lives in Moscow, Idaho, with her husband and their two children by adoption.

Sharon Roszia is founder of Parenting Resources and coauthor of Cooperative Adoption. She has worked in the field of adoption for thirty years and performs open adoption trainings for social workers and birth parents. The mother of grown children by birth, adoption, and through long-term foster care, she lives in Tustin, California.

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By the Same Author: Raising Adopted Children: A Manual For Adoptive Parents (1986, Solstice Press); Adoption: An Annotated Bibliography and Guide (1987, Routledge); and Making Sense of Adoption: A Parent’s Guide (1989, solstice Press).

The world of adoption has changed dramatically over the past twenty years. No longer do biological parents have to say goodbye to their child forever. They now have more options when deciding the type of adoption to pursue, such as open adoption. Open adoption creates the opportunity for a special relationship between the biological parents, the adoptive parents, and the child. Open Adoption, Open Heart is an inspiring and true story, which takes the reader deeper into the feelings and emotions experienced by adoptive parents. As you read this incredible story, you will experience the joys, difficulties, and amazing victories facing adoptive couples. Russell and his wife, Jammie, invite you to share in their inspiring and heart-warming journey.

Open Arms is a true adoption story that tells of when Russell and Jammie felt called to adoption for a second time. Not only does it start a whole new chapter in the Elkins family’s story, but it also continues the ongoing journey of the relationships built during their first adoption, told in the first installment of the series, Open Adoption, Open Heart. The Elkinses are living proof of the beauty in open adoption, building intimate and powerful relationships with their children’s biological parents. You will experience all of the joys, difficulties, and victories of adoptive parents as you read this incredible story.

Foster care is more than what I ever could have imagined it to be. It has been the biggest challenge of my life and, every once in a while, the most gratifying. If I can see just a glimpse of change in any of these boys, it lets me know that I am on the right track. Knowing that I have made a very small difference in these children’s lives is better than nothing at all. After watching her own mother struggle with mental illness and a history of abuse, S. Oliphant knew that she wanted to make a difference in the lives of children dealing with those same issues. After working in a residential facility, she finally decided, despite the fact that she was already a single mother, to take in foster children. With love, patience, and the belief that every child deserves a chance, S. Oliphant set out to battle the system and change the lives of children who are often forgotten. With Open Doors, Open Hearts, we really can make the world a better place for these children.

From the Dust Jacket: This is the true and personal story of King and Rachel Baker, a childless, middle-aged couple who left the dangerously placid life of a Los Angeles suburb for one hundred acres in middle Tennessee. There they planted an apple orchard, built a house, knew seasons, experienced violent weathers and tried to know their neighbors.

Learning to cope with the unexpected in a life full of discoveries, they developed a sense of confidence, an appetite for challenge, that made them say yes to taking in two children, Marilyn and Robbie, abandoned in the neighborhood.

The often shattering, exhausting experience of learning to tangle with the children’s ferocity and their terrible needs led to deep love. A family was forged of this and, when the biological parents reconciled and decided they wanted their children back, a family was destroyed in the process of a court hearing and a judge’s decision that went against the Bakers. The result was based on the antiquated assumption in American jurisprudence that children are chattels of their biological parents and have no voice in their own welfare.

Later, against advice and entreaties, Rachel went north in a desperate, frustrating effort to find and establish a link with the children. Ultimately she returned to Tennessee and to King, and together they set about picking up the pieces of their lives, cultivating their orchard and raising their goats, always haunted by the memory of their lost children.

Happily, the orchard flourished and in time was graced by the presence of an adopted baby, Melissa, who grew to be a teenager and who thought of the title for this book.

Mrs. Baker writes under the name Rachel Maddux. Her books include Abel’s Daughter and The Green Kingdom.

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Compiler’s Note: The book inspired a CBS television documentary, titled “Who Will Save the Children?” and starring Shirley Jones and Len Cariou, which aired in December of 1978.

From the Dust Jacket: When Laura Furman was only thirteen her mother died from ovarian cancer, leaving Laura adrift in a damaged family where mourning was not allowed and remembrance itself was discouraged.

This moving and powerful memoir chronicles the difficulties that result, as the author struggles to grow up untended and, in many ways, unnoticed.

In it, Furman first recaptures for us the texture of her happy childhood. She recalls the chilling numbness that enveloped her during her mother’s illness and death, and describes in heartbreaking detail the aftermath—her unheard cries for help; her eventual self-propelled recovery; and the poignant, thought-provoking decision she made as an adult to avoid the disease that had taken her mother’s life.

Ordinary Paradise expresses in exceptionally beautiful prose the subtle interrelationships that make growing up so difficult in a family where surface appearances matter more than reality. It is an unforgettable portrait of the author’s mother—her family’s emotional center—and of the author’s father, a complex, well-meaning man whose limitations caused unintentional harm.

Even more, it is a vivid confirmation of a mother’s value to her family and of the healing that motherhood itself can provide to a wounded heart.

Ultimately, the story is one of triumph as its author strives to capture the ordinary paradise of family life that so many of us take for granted.

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About the Author: Linda Furman, a native of New York City, is the author of five previous books, including the novels Tuxedo Park and The Shadow Line and two short story collections, The Glass House and Watch Time Fly. Her short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker and elsewhere; her essays in Mirabella, House & Garden, and other magazines. The founding editor of American Short Fiction, she has been the recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship, and has twice been awarded the Jesse Jones fiction award from the Texas Institute of Letters. She lives in Austin with her husband and son.

From the Back Cover (Revised Edition): Since the mid-1950’s, more than 30,000 Asian children have been adopted by American families. Yet little has been written about the cross-cultural experiences of these families. Oriental Children in American Homes is a comprehensive study of the cross-cultural experiences of these families. It is a result of the author’s research on cultural/psychological anthropology and cross-cultural adoption, as well as her interviews of over sixty persons (adoptive parents, their children and teachers). The book describes fundamental differences between Cunfucian and American cultures in a wide range of areas such as language, food, social relations, personality, methods of discipline, and education, and their effects on the adjustments of these families. It also explores these families’ motivations to adopt and the reactions of their relatives, friends and others to the adoptions, as well as these families’ feelings about their children’s cultural identity and the prejudice they have encountered. This is a book for adoptive parents and social workers striving to better understand the adopted children, as well as to others seeking to understand the cultural differences between the two worlds.

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About the Author: Frances Koh, a native of Korea, received a B.A. from Washington State University and attended the Boston University School of Social Work. A former adoption worker, she is a publishing executive as well as a freelance writer. Oriental Children in American Homes is her first book.

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By the Same Author: Adopted From Asia: How It Feels to Grow Up in America (1993, EastWest Press) and A China Adoption Story: Mommy, Why Do We Look Different? (2000, Azalea Books).

From the Back Cover: Orphan care is more than just adoption. At the heart of orphan care is grace. Grace that flows from Christ’s redemptive work on the Cross. Grace that reconciles us with God. Grace that we extend through the care of orphans and others.

The needs are urgent. Who will stand up for these tens of millions of children around the world? Or closer to home, who will step up to provide loving, Christian care for children in America’s foster care system?

With openness and integrity, Rick and Tony speak from firsthand experience. Orphanology details practical ways to get involved such as:

• Assisting adoptive parents in down-to-earth fashion

• Raising awareness of the crisis in orphan and foster care

• Developing a fund to assist potential adoptions

• Hosting orphans for a summer

• Underwriting an orphanage

• Starting an orphan care ministry in the local church

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About the Author: Rick Morton, along with his wife, Denise, played an integral role in the cofounding of Promise 139, and international orphan-hosting ministry. He serves as discipleship pastor at Temple Baptist Church in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, and has numerous youth ministry publications to his credit.

Pastor, professor, and father of five, Tony Merida has quickly become a leading voice in the growing movement for adoption and orphan care. His passion for the fatherless is evident through his writing, teaching, and speaking.

Tony and Rick are living examples of James 1:27—they have a combined eight adopted children between their families.

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By the Same Author: KnowOrphans: Mobilizing the Church for Global Orphanology (2014).

From the Dust Jacket: Experienced biographer Jeffrey Meyers delves into the complex personal history of the man whose visionary work gave us the great anti-utopias of twentieth-century literature. Meyers draws on a close study of the new edition of George Orwell’s Complete Works, interviews with his family and friends, and research into unpublished material in the Orwell Archive in London to shed new light on this most unusual literary figure.

A child of the waning British Empire, Orwell came to reject the stifling class system of his birth, and through his writing forged a new social consciousness that continues to engage modern intellectual thought. Meyers’s work also reveals the human failings of this creative visionary—his childhood insecurities, his political dilemmas, and his conflicted relationships with women. The Orwell who emerges from this book is a darker—but distinctly more nuanced—portrait of the legendary figure.

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About the Author: Jeffrey Meyers, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, has written biographies of such literary greats as D.H. Lawrence, Robert Frost, Ernest Hemingway, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

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Compiler’s Note: From Chapter 12, “Fatherhood & Eileen’s Death, 1944-1945”: “After eight years of marriage, it seemed clear that they were not going to have a child of their own and Orwell finally persuaded Eileen to adopt one. Gwen O’Shaughnessy, who’d already adopted a little girl, knew a patient who’d had a baby boy. He was born in May 1944, the result of a wartime affair with a Canadian soldier, and his mother wanted to give him up for adoption. ... They named the child Richard Horatio Blair.” (pp. 227-28).

From the Back Cover: This is a personal and touching story of one women’s journey to find a child.

Tamra spent eight years pursuing a child through fertility clinics without success. Her body would not cooperate and give her the child she wanted. The need for a child was so overwhelming they turned to adoption. Their adoption journey from start to finish took three years, while reading the story you will learn of the many pitfalls they had to overcome. The story has a happy ending with the adoption of their daughter.

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About the Author: Tamra Barton is not a doctor or a nurse, she just lived through the trials of infertility and adoption.

Before finding her niche in writing, she did a lot of different jobs. She owned her own barbershop for 12 years and sold it after Katie was placed in their home.

She started writing The Other Choice while sitting in the barbershop between customers. After Katie was adopted she finished the manuscript and searched for a publisher.

Her days were filled with taking care of her family, writing novels, teaching Sunday school, and riding her scooter around town.

This book tells the stories of nine families’ journeys to adopt Chinese children. Each absorbing account describes the unique hills and valleys involved in the process and how it has forever changed and enriched their lives. Ride along with each family as they traverse the emotional spectrum from fear and frustration to bliss and joy as they meet their children and begin the miracle of forming a forever-family through adoption. About the Author: D.L. Fuller lives in Little Elm, TX, with his wife, LuAnn, and his daughter, Julianna. He is a tax manager for a microchip company located in Carrolton, TX. In his spare time, he enjoys playing softball, writing, and spending time with his family. He is a member of the North Texas Chapter of Families with Children from China (FCCNT). He is the author of the children’s picture book, Who Are My Real Parents?. He regularly attends activities with the Playful Pandas supper club in Denton, TX. Contributors: Marybeth Lambe, Anna Gray, Gayle Kamen-Weinstein, MaLeesa D. Meyers, Susan Beth Morgan, Sue Casseday, Lynn Miller, and Joanne Swift.

From the Publisher: If you’re lucky, your community offers a course on adoptive parenting. If not, you can still receive the important information that such a course provides. Our Child is the instructor’s manual of a four-week course for expectant adoptive parents. It covers baby care (including the possibility of adoptive nursing), finding a doctor, dealing with family and friends, preparing siblings, and many other topics of interest to new adoptive parents. Since, as pre-adoptive parents, you often don’t know exactly when your child will join your family, it helps to have this book available just in case. It is a unique resource.

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About the Author: Carol Hallenbeck, B.S., R.N., is a professional prepared childbirth educator and public health nurse. To the field of parent preparation Carol brings an added dimension—her personal experiences as an infertility patient and as a parent both by adoption and by birth. Carol was cofounder of Indiana RESOLVE, Inc., among the largest and most innovative of the chapters of the national organization offering education, referral, advocacy and support services to infertile couples and the professionals who work with them. As an officer of this chapter, Carol was instrumental in forming Indiana’s uniquely successful Adoption Forum, an educational coalition of groups and agencies providing services to all of those in the adoption circle, and she developed and coordinated the OUR CHILD classes, which have been offered in several cities in Indiana since 1981. As well, Carol served on the steering committee and faculty for “WHY US?... Understanding Impaired Fertility I” the first educational symposium for infertile couples in the country.

The Hallenbecks and their three sons now live in a suburb of Philadelphia, where Carol is at work on the parents book to accompany this manual. If after reading this guide you decide to teach OUR CHILD type classes, please contact Carol Hallenbeck so that she can put people in your area who contact her in touch with you and can include information about your program in the parents book.

Adoption Training for Parents and Professionals. Adoptive parents commit incredible resources of time, money and emotions over such a long period that it is no wonder they can be seduced into believing they have “crossed the finish line” when placement finally occurs. This new training examines how the addition of a child by adoption affects you family to its very core. Visit our website at www.AdoptionTrainingOnline.com for information about Certified Training for The Hague International Adoption requirements and Continuing Education Credits for Professionals.

Our Children From Latin America is a warm and engaging book for those people who are considering or have already adopted from Latin America. It is the fascinating account of the author’s personal experiences with adoption. In addition to her own story, the book covers topics such as the health of Latin American children, emphasizing your child’s cultural heritage and what to tell a child about adoption.

From the Publisher: Parents record every milestone—from the first smile to the first day at school—in a child’s baby book for posterity. Thanks to best-selling author Judith Levy, adoptive parents can now express their joy and love for a child in a baby book created especially for them. Our Chosen Child omits the traditional space for recording details about the pregnancy, labor, and delivery, highlighting instead the special preparations adoptive parents make and the excitement and anticipation they feel. In Our Chosen Child, adoptive parents can record family history and all the milestones of childhood through high school graduation. Additionally, Our Chosen Child includes the milestones that an adoptive family achieves. A page entitled “Waiting for You” acknowledges the many steps along the journey to becoming an adoptive family, such as completing a home study and getting references. On the page entitled “When We First Saw You,” parents can capture the special moment when they first meet their intended child, whether as a newborn or as a five-year-old. The happy memories of the day the adoption is finalized are recorded on the “Adoption Day” page. Each page features original poetry by Judith Levy, such as this loving dedication: “You had a journey to make, A trip to come through, To parents who were praying, And waiting for you.” Judy Pelikan’s tender illustrations grace every page, making this book a beautiful keepsake. All adoptive parents will want to complete this treasury of memories for their own chosen child.

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About the Author: Author Judith Levy and artist Judy Pelikan began their successful collaboration in 1983 with Grandmother Remembers: A Written Heirloom for My Grandchild, which sold over two million copies and was number two on The New York Times best-seller list. Since then, they have had many best-selling books, including Grandfather Remembers (1986), Mom Remembers (1990), and Dad Remembers (1993). A grandmother of four, Judith lives in Boca Raton, FL. Her youngest grandchild is adopted. Judy lives in Sugar Hill, NH.