The Truth About International Adoption, Same-Sex Adoption, Adoption Records, Transracial Adoption, Closed Adoption, Typical Open Adoption, and Putting Your Child Up For Adoption, Plus Much More!

Finding information about adoption can be difficult; learning about adoption is frequently a world-of-mouth process. This book directed to prospective adoptive parents, should be useful as a starting point for those searching for an adoption agency or seeking adoption resources. More than 1,000 public and private agencies in the United States are listed. The information presented is based on data gathered between October 1987 and October 1988. Each entry, arranged by state, includes such information as the agency’s area of service, the cost, the waiting period, and the requirements. Adoptive parents should be able to find agencies whose programs and philosophies are in accord with their interests. The book points out the wide range of adoption options and resources. Whether single or married, twenty-eight years old or forty-seven years old, black or white, Catholic or Buddhist, childless or parents of five, rich or poor, there is an agency available. While directed to prospective adoptive parents, the book will be useful to all whose lives are touched by adoption: adoptive parents, birth parents, social workers, and children. The format of the book is attractive, and the arrangement makes it easy to use. A most worthwhile addition to library reference collections particularly to social-work libraries.

From the Publisher: In this practical book, Michelle McColm draws on extensive interviews with adoptees, birth parents and adoptive parents, as well as the experience of her own reunion.

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About the Author: Working in adoption disclosure at a Children’s Aid Society, Michelle McColm became familiar with the stories of adoptees and birth mothers alike. An adoptee herself, she has successfully navigated her way through a reunion with her birth mother and extended family. She now lives in Toronto.

In August of 1990, while relaxing in bed and watching 20/20, I learned about the horrible conditions and poor care that Romanian orphans receive. My husband and I were so moved by this program that we felt the Lord wanted us to do something. We prayed earnestly. Despite being in our late forties and thinking about retiring, the difficulties of the culture shock, the language barrier, the bad conditions, and the Gulf war, we decided that I would go to this third-world country and try to adopt two children. This is the five and a half week account of my stay in Romania and the things that I saw, heard and went through while I experienced Adoption Romanian Style.

From the Publisher: This 20-page scrapbook album comes with 15 8x8 transparency overlays with an adoption theme, along with a coupon for 5 free overlays at the publisher’s web site. This way you can personalize your baby’s adoption book with his or her story (Do you know the birth mom? Was it foreign or local?, etc.)

Pages included: The Wait; The Day the Call Came; We’re going to meet our baby!; Our first 15 minutes; Perfect Love; Who says there is no such thing as...; Dreams do come true; Oh how we love this precious little face; Darling baby; The middle of the night; Adoption: It’s a word we’ll never hide; Today I Kissed an Angel; It’s official—adoption day!; Adoption certificate; and Making Magical Memories.

Choose 5 from others such as: My Little Angel Baby; All the emotions you bring us; Precious; Of you I dreamed; Just play; Choosing your name; The Homestudy; We never gave up hope!; Anticipation... and Shopping! The Silly Things we Bought You; Meeting Your Birthmom; Special Letter; All of God; Plane Travel; Pick up at the Airport; Time to go home!; Meeting Extended Family; Mommy Moments; Daddy Time; Baby Shower; The day you arrived-(appropriate for older child/foster child); Follow up with the counselor; Visit with birthmom; or About your birthfather.

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About the Author: Lisa Copen is a woman who said she would never scrapbook—and then her adopted son arrived. She didn’t want to miss a single precious moment. But scrapbooking those moments nearly took over her life! So she came up with a faster solution, scrapbooking with pre-designed adoption transparency overlays. Lisa is also the founder of Rest Ministries, which serves the chronically ill and author of many books on chronic illness.

From the Dust Jacket: Adopting a child can be a joyous and rewarding experience, but the road to a successful adoption is often riddled with obstacles. The Adoption Sourcebook provides the answers, covering legal, financial, and emotional issues families must address to ensure a smooth adoption, including:

• Complete information on open, closed, agency, international, and single-parent adoption procedures

• Personal accounts from birthmothers, adoptive parents, and children about their adoption experiences

• Up-to-date resources, including agencies, private adoption services, support groups, and Web sites.

With warmth and candor, adoption consultant Cheryl Jones, navigates all stages of this complicated, sometimes intimidating process with easy-to-understand language and practical tips for a smooth, hassle-free adoption.

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About the Author: Cheryl Jones, M.S.W., owns and operates International Adoption Consultants, which offers counseling, legal guidance, dossier preparation, and other services to prospective adoptive parents. She has worked in the adoption field since 1979 facilitating adoptions both nationally and internationally. She lives with her husband and two sons in Atlanta, Georgia.

From the Back Cover: Since 1952 nearly 45,000 children have been legally adopted in Ireland. It is estimated that a similar number of illegal adoptions have also taken place in that time. In Adoption Stories people share their experience and talk about the impact adoption has had on their lives.

While an adopted child has the same rights as one born into a family, all legal ties to the natural parents are severed. At present, under Irish law, adopted people and natural parents are prohibited from accessing information about each other, unless they appeal to the authorities. As a result, adopted people don’t know their true identity and mothers don’t know what became of their child. Reunion is sometimes fulfilling and rewarding; other times it only emphasises the great distance that has opened up between parent and child.

For some, international adoption is the only way they can have a family, and that presents many of the same emotions and challenges as in the past. Adoption remains as much part of life today as in 1952 and it affects nearly every family in Ireland.

Based on the popular TV3 series, Adoption Stories is a fascinating window onto the extraordinary experience of natural parents, adopted children and their adoptive families alike.

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About the Author: Sharon Lawless has always wanted to tell stories that get a reaction, whether it’s laughter, tears, anger or enlightenment. With a long career in media, apart from five years managing nightclubs, she has advertised, PRd, event managed, produced and directed the best of them and really believes in working at what you love. She was first on a film set before she was born and it’s still what makes her smile. Her best friends are her family and she lives in Dublin with her partner Alf and cat Cookie.

When Joe was seven years old, his birth mother told him he was adopted by his dad. Join him in this emotional and inspiring journey through being an adopted son, facing the realities of infertility, adopting a beautiful son of his own, and finally, being reunited with his birth father. This book is an uplifting and thought provoking story on the struggles of infertility, the adoption process, and the joys of reconciliation. About the Author: Joe Garrity lives in rural Missouri with his wife and son, whom they brought home in October of 2011. In addition to writing about his life, Joe is an active member of the community as a high school teacher and coach. He has also written and released three music CDs about the experiences of his life. You can find out more about the author, as well as other works by him, at www.garritymusic.com.

From the Dust Jacket: Heart-rending issues concerning custody, infertility, surrogate motherhood, and other related concerns have captured headlines lately. Here is the human dimension of these issues—a powerful true story of fierce parental love, with deeply caring adoptive parents pitted against a child’s birth mother in a dramatic struggle for custody.

Marguerite Ryan and her husband, after repeated disappointments due to failure to conceive, begin the lengthy process of adopting the newborn child of an unmarried Salvadoran domestic. They fall passionately in love with the baby and bond with him completely. Then, just as the adoption papers are due to be finalized, the child’s birth mother refuses to sign. She decides she wants the baby, although she has no home for him or money to care for him.

The Ryans become involved in a bitter, suspenseful court battle for possession of the baby. One court says yes, another says no over and over as they appeal. Meanwhile Christopher is growing up as the Ryans’ child, although a court order permits visitation by the birth mother, Angelina, so that the baby will know her in the event she is awarded final custody. In one of the book’s most moving scenes, as Angelina starts to take Christopher from his home for a weekend, the child screams in terror for his adoptive mother to rescue him, as the adults grapple for him.

Amidst this conflict, the author, who has returned to her Catholic faith, seeking emotional support, has a revelation. In church on Easter Sunday she hears the priest say, “Lord, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” She is inspired to create a unique solution, one that, though unconventional, is right for all of them.

This beautifully uplifting, evocative story, which reads like a novel, will appeal to all readers who ever have felt the joy and privilege of love of a child.

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About the Author: Marguerite Ryan is a pseudonym the author has adopted to protect the privacy of Christopher and the younger brother the Ryans have since adopted without any of the difficulty they experienced with Christopher. She lives with her husband and two young sons in New York City.

Adoption subsidies provide financial assistance, medical coverage and support services to families adopting special-needs children. These subsidy programs serve two related purposes: first, to increase adoptions by removing financial barriers for prospective parents and second, to help sustain adoptive families who experience unexpected needs that are not evident at the time of adoption. Adoption Subsidy covers both federal programs, including Title IV-E and SSI, and state programs. It gives detailed information on how to negotiate a subsidy agreement, appeal a decision, apply for retroactive payments after a final adoption decree, and respond to critics of subsidy programs. It also includes tables to use in calculating subsidy amounts.

From the Back Cover: A much-needed anthology addressing a variety of potential psychological and physiological concerns, Adoption Therapy: Perspectives from Clients and Clinicians on Processing and Healing Post-Adoption Issues is a must-read for adoptees, adoptive parents, first families, and vitally, mental health professionals. With writing by adoptees, adoptive parents, and clinicians, Adoption Therapy is a first-of-its-kind and wholly unique reference book, providing insight, advice, and personal stories which highlight the specific nature of the adoptee experience. Topics Include:

• The psychological dangers in leaving trauma and grief buried and unaddressed

• The importance of community in healing the wounds of separation

• Understanding the physical and psychological effects of transracial adoption

• Attachment—including the inability to attach, inappropriate attachment, and the myth of Reactive Attachment Disorder

• Conception by rape: an adoptee speaks out

• Co-dependency, intimacy, and creating closeness

• The life-long effects of pre- and perinatal trauma

• Processing complex trauma, complex grief, and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

• Specific concerns for Late Discovery Adoptees

• The relationship among trauma, anger and rage, and substance abuse

• For adoptive parents and adoptees: red flags when working with a therapist

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About the Author: Laura Dennis was born and adopted in New Jersey and raised in Maryland. She earned a B.A. and M.F.A. in dance performance and choreography, with a certificate in critical theory. She gave up aches and pains and bloody feet to become a sales director for a biotech startup. Then with two children under the age of three, in 2010 she and her husband sought to simplify their lifestyle and escaped to his hometown, Belgrade. While the children learned Serbian in their cozy preschool, Laura recovered from sleep deprivation and wrote Adopted Reality: A Memoir.

An adoptee activist in reunion, she writes at The Lost Daughters, Adoption Voices Magazine and her own blog, Expat (Adoptee) Mommy. Her essays have been published in Lost Daughters: Writing Adoption from a Place of Empowerment and Peace, and The Perpetual Child: Dismantling the Stereotype. Laura is passionate about giving voice to the adoptee experience and is proud to have edited the popular anthology, Adoption Reunion in the Social Media Age.

Adoption has changed a lot in the last 30 years, but a lot of myths and stereotypes persist. Attorney and A Gift of Hope Adoptions Executive Director, Dewey Crepeau, explains how things have changed and what you should really expect when you pursue adoption today.

This book collects the experiences and advice of families who learned about adoption, successfully added a child to their family, and are now willing to teach us by sharing their experiences, reflecting the great variety of choices open to those seeking to adopt and the outcomes of those choices. Each family’s story starts with factual information about the child, the adoptive family, type of adoption and financial and timing information. The adoptive parents also wrote several paragraphs about their adoption experiences.

Who am I really? applies to all parties in the adoption triad—birth mother and father, adoptee, and adoptive mother and father. We once thought adoption was the answer to everyone’s dilemma. The mother could get on with her life. The baby would have a wonderful home. The new parents would have a child of their own. Now, we know this has never been true. everyone involved was suffering and unable to voice the pain. In spite of the hundreds of articles and books written by and about the adoption triad, each wonders why others cannot see their pain. The general public wonders why any of them have pain, since adoption seems to be the answer for everyone involved. Adoption is traumatic for both adoptee and birth mother and the majority search for each other often causing fear for the adoptive parents. Early separation affects the baby that was connected to the mother for nine months, leaving an innate need to find that connection again. Adoption is both a good thing and a bad thing. Every child deserves to have a stable home. To be adopted means someone had to give them up first. The big problem is secrecy. Adoptees do not have any biological roots; no genetic tie to anyone, and often cannot get their original birth certificates even as an adult. In New South Wales, Australia, children keep their names and biological history, as they become part of a new family. Adoptees from South Korea have dual citizenship since they had no choice in the matter. Every person has the right to know their origins and the truth about themselves. Every mother has the right to know the well being of the child she relinquished. Adoptive parents should not be pitied nor looked upon as saints for taking someone else’s child. Adoptees have reason to fear intimate relationships because the person may be a biological parent or sibling. Adoption changes genealogy and kinship patterns are forever. Each member of the adoption triad needs to be able to say they are part of more than one family just as families of divorce. Having someone else’s name and history implies ownership, not honesty and love. We need to understand and acknowledge the pain so we as a society and individuals can lead a happy, healthy life.

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About the Author: Alice B. Davenport has been a Certified Family Life Educator living in Las Cruces, NM, for the past 16 years. She owns a sewing shop where people not only come to get their clothes altered, but just to discuss life in general. Having been a night worker, she understands the need to talk and socialize after work. She often speaks at groups of people during the night or early morning hours. Alice grew up poor and has lived in several states such as Missouri, Tennessee, Alabama, Colorado and Idaho. Her son and grandchildren live in Idaho. She has a Master of Science degree in Family and Consumer Science from New Mexico State University (1997). She works with victims of domestic violence, adoptees, grandparents raising grandchildren, people who love an addict, and other family issues. Alice has presented workshops at professional conferences in Connecticut, Texas, and New Mexico. Like many other people, she worked several years to get a Ph.D., ran out of money and time and did not complete it. She will return to New Mexico State University this Fall to begin a Master’s of Art degree in communication studies.

From the Back Cover: “Lucy, please come and sit down. I need to talk to you.” Lucy sat beside me on the settee.

I couldn’t think of how to say the words and so I started with, “I am so sorry, Lucy.” I couldn’t stop the tear. “I am so sorry!” Lucy hated tosee me upset and she tried to put her arms around me as she said, “Is it Dad?” And then she said it. “Do I have to move?”

Not every relationship is built to last. But when adopters are totally committed to offering the permanence that adopted children so desperately seek, a severance of relationships between an adopted child and their adoptive parents and siblings is particularly harrowing.

This is the true story of an adoption and an adoption breakdown, bravely told by the adoptive mother. From the final court hearing, when Lucy returned to local authority care, Karen Carr looks back over the four years Lucy was with them and, without apportioning blame, describes what went wrong and why. She doesn’t spare herself, her family or the social workers, and she paints a touching picture of Lucy at the centre of events which she triggers but cannot understand. However, this is not only a tale of loss and regret but also courage, generosity and self-discovery.

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About the Author: Karen Carr is a Senior Social Worker in a Children In Need Team in the North West of England. She is looking for a new challenge now that this book is complete.

Have you finally completed your paperwork, home studies and interviews for adoption and are now playing the difficult waiting game? Are you waiting for that elusive telephone call that will change your life forever? Waiting adoptive couples often tell a tale of helplessness, stress and sleepless nights. In an effort to help couples avoid her own mistakes, Drew Elizabeth Seymour carefully compiled the remarkable suggestions and strategies of many successful adoptive moms and dads. Their practical, sage advice and incredible gems of wisdom are contained on the pages of this book. In simple, refreshing language, Drew reveals twenty-one shockingly simple suggestions and tips that waiting adoptive moms and dads can implement immediately to take control again. To encourage and give hope to waiting couples, the author shares her own heartwarming adoption journey. Her amazing experience will prove that hope and the human spirit can triumph over any temporary disappointment or setback.

About the Author: The stories in this book will lift the spirit, comfort the soul, draw a tear to the eye or even provide a chuckle for anyone who has had a personal connection with adoption. For others, the stories will create a broader understanding of the great emotional investment made by birth parents, adoptive parents and adoptees in this loving, life-long commitment that can bring joy, satisfaction and fulfillment into their lives.

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About the Author: Shirley Budd Pusey was awarded a B.S. in Sociology and a Graduate Certificate in Social Work by the University of Utah. Prior to joining the staff of Family Service Agency of Phoenix as an adoption counselor, she was with the Denver Department of Child Welfare. She remained in that position for over 32 years until retirement. She was one of the first certified members of the Arizona Supreme Court’s Confidential Intermediary Program established in 1993 to facilitate reunions of consenting adult members of the adoption triad and continues to serve in that capacity. Shirley is a wife, mother of two daughters and grandmother of five.

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By the Same Author: Adoption Reunion Stories: True Heart-Warming Accounts (2006, Acacia Publishing).

From the Publisher: In Adoption Without Fear, 17 couples give the stories of their experiences with open adoption. The reader shares in their joy and pain as they travel the road to adoption. They describe the bittersweet feelings as they add a child to their family while watching the birth parents say good-bye. Through these first person narratives, you come to understand what the term open adoption really means.

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About the Author: James L. Gritter is Child Welfare Supervisor for Community, Family and Children Services in Traverse City, Michigan. He has an M.S.W. from Western Michigan University and is a member of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy.

From the Dust Jacket: The picture on adoption has changed completely within the last few years. Agencies are crying for parents. Families with their own biological children are being permitted to adopt, as are single people. Interracial adoptions are on the upswing. Agencies are trying harder and harder to get hard-to-place children adopted—older children, the handicapped, the retarded.

Such questions as the risks involved in raising adopted children (pretty much the same as for your own children), adoption immediately after the death of your own biological child, increase in illegitimacy, your reasons for adopting, the relation with the agency, what to do while you are waiting for your child, the doubts that arise while you wait, getting the child and during the next months making him your own—all these are covered thoroughly in a warm and sympathetic style.

Should you decide on adopting, the book tells you how to go about it. Though there are no overall standards, rules, or procedures that are true of every single agency, there are some standards and procedures true of most adoption agencies in most areas.

Mrs. Dywasuk, herself a biological and adoptive mother, knows just what questions will occur in the minds of the would-be adoptive parents. She explains how to tell your child that he is adopted without overstressing; she points out that, on the average, adopted children have a much lower rate of delinquency and law-breaking than children brought up by their biological parents.

If, through the years, you have brought up your child with love and understanding, if you have made him feel secure and good about himself and where he came from, he will find within himself the power and the means of coping with the facts of his existence. He will still feel good about himself and his background. The road ahead will be a fulfilling one.

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About the Author: Colette Dywasuk was born in Michigan and lives there now with her husband and four children, the youngest of whom is adopted. She decided to write this book because she needed one herself and couldn’t find it. She tells us the research and the writing took about eighteen months. “I was amazed at the willingness of busy people to go out of their way to help me in my research. Experts whom I contacted were very helpful. Adoptive parents were happy to share their experiences with me. I found a great-many people who felt there was a real need for such a book. During the last two months of writing I worked ten hours a day, extremely difficult with four small children. Some days I started working at 3:00 a.m. Other days I went to bed at that time. ... My book reflects the changes, the choices, the considerations of adoption today.”

Mrs. Dywasuk has been-writing for as long as she can remember. She has been published in a number of magazines, including Our Sunday Visitor, Daily Meditation, and The Lutheran. This is her first book. She enjoys tennis, bowling, bicycling, camping, sewing, and the duties of motherhood. She and her family live in a suburb of Detroit.

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By the Same Author: Adoption and After (posthumously revised book originally written by Louise Raymond) (1987, HarperCollins); and Sixth of Twelve: A Memoir (2016, Lakeside Publishers).

When Nikki Biers and her husband were beginning to look into adoption, they had no idea what to expect or where to start. They met with an adoption attorney who was very thorough legally, but had no idea how to support them emotionally. First adoption experiences can be overwhelming and even a little frightening especially not knowing what questions to ask or what to expect from a birth mother. They wished there had been some kind of reference material or book to let them know if they were on the right track and where they were in the adoption process. Through the adoption of their three children as well as years as an experienced adoption facilitator, Nikki realized she wasn’t alone in her desire for information. Adoption, The Best Gift was born from this need for basic procedural and emotional guidance. Each chapter covers an important step toward making the dream of family a reality. The book is rich with examples of actual client stories, as well as their joys, fears and concerns during the process of bringing their babies into their families. These personal examples and the documentation of the various emotions that may surface along the way, combined with clear explanations of what to expect, make Adoption, The Best Gift an essential guide for anyone considering adoption.

Finally, a practical, reader-friendly book for adoptive and foster parents! The first part of The Adoptive & Foster Parent Guide effortlessly explains topics that are pertinent to adoptive and foster families including: the four attachment styles, detachment (which leads to attachment disorders) and unique family issues, such as: family triangles and birth families. All attachment styles are clearly explained along with practical strategies, scripts, and stories to show parents how to create a healthy attachment or relationship. Many families struggle with triangulation where one person feels like an outsider in the family; the book illustrates how to change this unhealthy dynamic. The subject of birth family raises many questions and feelings for parents, and this chapter shows options through numerous family examples. This information will be helpful to the newly arrived home family as well as the experienced family. Adopted and foster children enter a family with a history of loss and/or trauma. In the second half of the book practical strategies, vignettes, and tips teach parents how to maintain a calm home, manage their child’s behavior, and heal their child’s trauma and loss through the guidance of step-by-step instruction. Since most opportunities to heal a child’s loss or trauma occurs in the home, this part of the book equips parents to re-create an incident with a better outcome forming a healing experience. As a result of early deprivation, children may see a few to many professionals, and typically are also involved in school or community activities. Commonly, parents believe that a provider will manage their child’s care but in actuality, this is often not the case. The third part of the book explains how parents can arrange, monitor, and coordinate their child’s mental and physical health care.

Adoptive Parent Intentional Parent: A Formula for Building and Maintaining Your Child’s Safety Net is an invaluable tool that adoptive parents will use over and over again. Whether you are in the “waiting stage” or you are two, four, six, or even ten plus years into your adoption ... this book will to enable you to reframe your situation with a clear vision, new knowledge, tools that work, and the support of others who have walked the path before you. Every child who has been adopted has suffered a breech in attachment; no adopted child is exempt. In addition to attachment issues, some children also suffer with difficult behavior issues amongst diagnoses such as RAD, FAS, and those that suffer with grief, anxiety, sensory issues and the effects of trauma. The author’s breakthrough concept of intentionally creating a safety net to help your child heal fills the book’s entirety. The four-part formula for building and maintaining that safety net is laid out in a detailed and user-friendly fashion. It combines the value of knowing yourself, the power of knowledge, specific tools and techniques that work in everyday life and the keys to maintaining the net over time to create a plan you can put into motion today.

From the Back Cover: Sharing insights and real-life stories from the adoption journey, The Adoptive Parent Toolbox is designed to be a guide to any stage of the journey, whether you are thinking about adoption, just starting the process, or thinking about starting all over again. Each chapter delivers real-life perspectives from the Berrys’ 14-year journey as well as the advice and wisdom of hundreds of other families who have adopted both internationally and domestically. Everything from what to expect when you first begin the process, to handling difficult adoptions, the different costs involved, to post adoption advice when it comes to trauma or attachment issues. The Adoptive Parent Toolbox is a comprehensive guide to just about any aspect on the adoption journey.

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About the Author: Mike and Kristin Berry have been married for 17 years and have eight children, all of whom are adopted. Their blog confessionsofanadoptiveparent.com is read by more than 40,000 people monthly, around the globe. They are sought-after speakers, and teachers, traveling all over the United States every year speaking to conferences and retreats. They reside on the Northside of Indianapolis, Indiana.

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By the Same Author: Confessions of an Adoptive Parent: Hope and Help from the Trenches of Foster Care and Adoption (2018, Harvest House Publishers).

From the Back Cover: Adoptive Parenting from the Ground Up is an essential resource for any parent building their family through the adoption of an older infant or child. Drawing from a wide range of professional disciplines, it provides a user-friendly framework of research for today’s adoptive parent. The focus of Adoptive Parenting from the Ground Up is recognizing and parenting mild to moderate issues. Topics include:

• Preparing to adopt

• Brain development

• Understanding and building attachment

• Sensory issues

• The internal alarm

• Understanding the difference between a behavior that is “regular kid stuff” or something that may signal a concern.

• General parenting and discipline for the child for the child who waited.

While the book provides information useful to those in the pre-adoption stages, parents will find themselves reaching for Adoptive Parenting from the Ground Up time and time again.

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About the Author: Author Katie Prigel Sharp holds a masters degree in social work. As an adoptive mother, Ms. Sharp co-founded Heart of the Matter Seminars, an organization that provides the Because They Waited&tm; education system, live presentations and other products to adoptive parents, foster parents and professionals who work with these families. She lives in Lee’s Summit, Missouri with her husband and two children.

About the Author: Patricia Irwin Johnston, MS, is an infertility and adoption educator and advocate with over 30 years of experience as both a volunteer (with local and national advocacy groups in the field) and as professional (publisher at Perspectives Press, Inc.) in the field of challenged family building. She is the author of several award-winning books (the most recent, Adopting: Sound Choices, Strong Families won the 2009 IPBA Benjamin Franklin Award as best self-help book and a 2010 Mom’s Choices Award) and has herself been given several awards, including being named a 2007 Angel in Adoption by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption. A member of an extended family directly touched through five generations by adoptions, Pat and her husband live in Indianapolis.

Born from Professor George C. Klein’s adoption of two Romanian babies in 1990, this work is a personal and analytical autobiography. Compiling data from the 1989 Romanian revolution, the oppression that led to the overthrow of Communism, and his personal experiences in Romania, The Adventure is primarily a description of the torturous process he and his wife endured in order to adopt two babies from a Romanian orphanage. It is also an examination of Romanian society from an institutional, national, and global perspective. The author analyzes individual issues such as forced pregnancies, neglect in orphanages, and economic deprivation. Professor Klein examines how the Romanian Communist Party held power in that era and explores the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe. His adept study discusses the various socio-economic and political factors that led to the collapse of Communism, and, ultimately, to the successful adoption of his Romanian children. About the Author: George C. Klein, Ph.D., is a professor of Sociology/Anthropology at Oakton Community College in Des Plaines, IL.

From the Publisher: Many questions concerning adoption are discussed by the authors after many years of keeping in close touch with adoptive parents, child-placing agencies, social workers, and all the professions interested in the physical, psychological, and legal aspects of adoption. Adoptive parents themselves, they see inside the adopter’s mind and present him with facts, suggesting definite steps on how to achieve happy adoptive family life.

From the Dust Jacket: In After Great Pain, Diane Cole confronts a series of painful personal experiences with unusual clarity and insight, starting with the early death of her mother. She also writes about the illness of the man she would eventually marry, the horrors of being taken hostage, and the pain of infertility and miscarriage. After Great Pain is a courageous reckoning with the past that ultimately moves Diane Cole to explore loss in the lives of others, and to probe the realm of psychological theory for an explanation not only of why we hurt, but of how we can begin to heal.

What begins as a book of ineffable sadness ultimately becomes one of inspiration and joy. For Diane Cole discovers that loss can lead to transformation—in her case, a new vision of who she was and could be as a woman, daughter, wife, lover, and now, finally, as an adoptive mother.

Every loss is painful, opening a void within us, but as Diane Cole vividly demonstrates, out of that pain can come renewal, redefinition, and hope.

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About the Author: Diane Cole has written on diverse subjects for many national publications, including Psychology Today, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. This is her second book. She lives in Manhattan with her husband and son.

From the Publisher: This book, planned to be the first of a trilogy, starts with her early life in Peru, Indiana, and leads the reader quickly through her awakening concern for war-torn Viet Nam, resulting in the decision to adopt three children of mixed race from that country. Eventually, as a nurse, Cherie decides to go to Viet Nam, along with her husband and seven small children, to open a home for abandoned and orphaned children. The book is a moving and dynamic account of her ceaseless struggle to nourish and find adoptive homes for hundreds of children, while living within the hell that followed the American withdrawal from Viet Nam. The story culminates in April 1975 when, through Operation Babylift, Cherie is safely airlifted out with her children, only to return to help others escape on the last planeload of babies to be rescued from Viet Nam.

The final two chapters give a glimpse of what is to come in the rest of the trilogy. Following her departure from Viet Nam, a restless Cherie went to Calcutta and met with Mother Teresa, who invited her to come and work with her. Determined to carry on her work with orphans, Cherie returned to India with her own young children in 1976. There they lived in some of the poorest slums as she opened dispensaries and clinics and rescued thousands of babies and children from orphanages, prisons, and the back streets of Calcutta. In the process she helped nearly ten thousand children find adoptive homes in America and throughout the world.

In 1988 Cherie accepted an invitation to join a delegation to become one of the first Westerners to travel to Viet Nam, by then an entirely communist country. Returning to Saigon after an absence of twelve years, Cherie felt she was returning home. Picking up from where she had been forced to leave off years before, she began working with Vietnamese officials and plunged headlong into the task of helping the poor, the unwanted and the orphaned. This book has 130 dramatic pictures to take you through the journey. This is a story that will inspire you as well as bring you to tears. It is one of those books that simply cannot be put down.

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About the Author: Cherie Clark is a courageous, giving woman who embodies a love that transcends color, race, religion and politics. She is fiercely determined to give all children a chance in life that fate has seemingly cheated them out of. Cherie founded the International Mission of Hope, now a thriving and respected organization, funded solely by donations, which is involved in feeding and caring for children and elderly people, helping with disaster relief and reforestation, and facilitating the adoption of some 250 children every year. Cherie’s group has also built a rural health care clinic in My Lai. She and most of her family currently live in Hanoi and operate child care centers throughout Viet Nam.