When You Were Born In China: A Memory Book for Children Adopted from China

Sara Dorow

Tells children about social conditions in China when orphans were put up for adoption and the process children go through on their way to adoption.

All About Adoption: How Families are Made and How Kids Feel About It

Marc A. Nemiroff

Using simple language and pictures, the book describes the stages of the adoption process and discusses complex feelings commonly felt by adopted children.

What Do We Think About Adoption?

Jillian Powell

This book looks at adoption, the feelings of insercurity than can sometimes arise, and the nature of biological parents, adoptive parents, and foster parents.

Carolyn's Story: A Book About an Adopted Girl

Perry Schwartz

A nine-year-old girl describes her life and her feelings about being adopted as a baby in Honduras.

How I Was Adopted

Joanna Cole

A young girl tells the story of how she came to be her paren'ts child through adoption. Straightforward language explains how a child grows in a mother's body, but how sometimes that child goes to live with another family.

Tell Me About The Night I Was Born

Jamie Lee Curtis

A young girl asks her parents to tell her again the chrished family story of her birth and adoption.

A New Barker In The House

Tomie DePaola

Twins Moffie and Morgie are excited when they hear that their family is adopting a three-year-old Hispanic boy.

You're Not My Real Mother!

Molly Friedrich

An adoptive mother explains to her Asian daughter why she is indeed the girl's "real mother," because of all the different ways she cares for her.

Parents Wanted

George Harrar

Twelve-year-old Andrew, who has ADD, is adopted by new parents after years of other foster homes. He desperately hopes that he will not mess up the situation.

Get Real

Betty Hicks

Destiny, a thirteen-year-old control freak who feels alenated in her messy, haphazzard family, helps her adopted best friend when she finds her birth mother and decides to have a relationship with her.

A Mother For Choco

Keiko Kasza

A lonely little bird goes in search of a mother and finds one where he least expected.

Bringing Asha Home

Uma Krishnaswami

Arun is eager to be a big brother, but he and his parents must wait patiently for the baby they hope to adopt from India to join their family.

Megan's Birthday Tree: A Story About Open Adoption

Laurie Lears

Every year on Megan's birthday, her birth mother Kendra, sends a picture of the tree she planted the day Megan was born. When Kendra decides to get married and move to a new house, Megan worries that she will be forgotten.

If It Hadn't Been for Yoon Jun

Marie G. Lee

Although reluctant at first, popular seventh grader Alice Larsen forms a friendship with a new student from Korea and comes to appreciate her own Korean heritage.

Saffy's Angel

Hilary McKay

When thirteen-year-old Saffy learns that she was adopted, her relationships with family members are strained. A trip to Italy, the country of her birth, helps her understand the choices made by the loving adults in her life.

The White Swan Epress: A Story About Adoption

Jean Davies Okimoto

Across North America, people in four different homes prepare for a special trip China, while four baby girls in China await their new adoptive parents.

A Child's Journey Through Placement

Vera Fahlberg

This book MUST be required reading for ALL adoptive families for insuring they have true insight on parenting their child responsivly. Being a mother desperately looking for the "why" my adopted child behaves as he does and "why" four years of traditional treatment hasn't mattered, I now have these answers and far greater insight as to what to do next. Dr. Fahlberg has provided the comprehensive guide for all who care about advocating children with all kinds of behavior and disorder issues. Dr. Fahlberg's "A Child's Journey Through Placement" is the Dr. Spock book for all adoptive parenting - outstanding material, information and very well written.

Review by jfilgo@gdats.com

Gregory Keck and Regina Kupecky

Without avoiding the grim statistics, this book reveals the real hope that hurting children can be healed through adoptive and foster parents, social workers, and others who care. Includes information on foreign adoptions.

Adopting The Older Child

Claudia L. Jewett

Pros, cons, and how-to's for an increasingly popular option.

Attaching In Adoption: Practical Tools For Parents

Deborah Gray

Proper attachment is the most fundamental issue in a successful adoption, but what exactly does the term mean? Attaching in Adoption answers that question thoroughly, and it provides solutions to a variety of specific attachment problems.

Attachment, Trauma, and Healing: Understanding and Treating Attachment Disorder in Children and Families

Michael Orlans/Terry M. Levy

Attachment is the deep and enduring connection established between a child and caregiver in the first few years of life. It profoundly influences every component of the human condition: mind, body, emotions, relationships, and values.

Helping Children Cope With Separation and Loss

Claudia Jewett Jarratt

Making Sense of Adoption

Lois Ruskai Melina

When to tell, What to tell, and How to tellChildren who are adopted have predictable and often unspoken concerns about themselves and how they joined their families. In this wise and timely guide, Lois Melina, author of the classic manual Raising Adopted Children, helps parents anticipate and respond to those concerns in ways that build self-esteem.

Older Child Adoption

Grace Robinson

This book is a very helpful tool for those who are planning to adopt an older child. The interviews and stories present a realistic picture of the challenges and opportunities that adoptive parents of older children must face.

Primal Wound

Nancy Verrier

As an adoptee, I could not have written this book better myself. It is an extremely insightful book which opened up a world of understanding to myself and also to my loved ones. It helped me understand why I am the way that I am, why I do some of the things that I do, why I struggle with love in my life, and why I have this subconscious fear of abandonment and trust.

This book is a definite "must read" for all parents of adopted children. I know that as a parent you will resist believing in the Primal Wound but you must for the benefit of your children. You will learn to understand your adopted children and will be able to help them throughout their lives - sometimes even in the smallest way, i.e. the simple reassurance that you WILL return home after work.

I met my birth family at 30 years old. Then I read this book a few years later. This book made a difference in my life. It will make a difference in your life, too. Enjoy!

Thank you Nancy Newton Verrier!!

Review by Coco Ventura

Raising Adopted Children

Lois Ruskai

In this comprehensive exploration of adoption issues (bonding and attachment, family adjustment, contact with biological relatives, etc.), the authoran adoptive parent and the editor of Adopted Child newsletteraims for a wide audience: parents, adoptees, and related professionals.

Raising Children Who Refuse To Be Raised

Dave Ziegler

Raising Children who Refuse to Be Raised is a handbook no natural, foster or adoptive parent should be without. Anyone who lives or works with children with multiple problems who are also frightened, traumatized and angry will benefit from the advice of this master counselor and foster parent.

Raising Resilient Children

Robert Brooks and Sam Goldstein

In this practical handbook for parents, clinical psychologists Brooks and Goldstein draw on their considerable experience working with children and families to demonstrate that parents' core goal should be to instill in their children a sense of inner recourse. "A resilient child is an emotionally healthy child, equipped to successfully confront challenges and bounce back from setbacks," they contend, and to this end they provide 10 parenting "guideposts" for nurturing the kind of resilience that helps children thrive. 

Real Parents, Real Children: Parenting The Adopted Child

Holly Van Gulden and Lisa M. Bartels-Rabb

Required reading for adoptive families, those considering adoption, or professionals in the field. This practical, informative book covers topics of vital importance to adoptive parents with sensitivity and insight. The authors bring years of experience to the complex emotional issues that parents will negotiate, and expert advice on establishing a healthy, loving parent-child relationship.

Telling The Truth To Your Adopted or Foster Child

Betsy Keefer and Jayne Schooler

Answers the question, why do adopted children need the facts about their history, and provides tools that parents can use for the telling.

The Family of Adoption

Joyce Pavao

Joyce Maguire Pavao dedicates her book The Family of Adoption in part to her two mothers, who died two weeks apart. "They both died of secrecy," she writes. "One could no longer talk, silenced by her disease. One could no longer think or remember.... I love and cherish what each of my mothers endured and imparted.... I refuse to have secrets and I work to change a system that perpetrates them."

The Whole Life Adoption Book: Realistic Advice for Building a Healthy Adoptive Family

Jayne Schooler

Authors Jayne E. Schooler and Thomas C. Atwood share insights into every aspect of adoption. This powerful resource addresses the needs and concerns facing adoptive parents while offering encouragement for the journey ahead.

Toddlers Adoption: The Weavers Craft

M. Hopkins -Best

When a child is adopted as a toddler, his needs and those of his adoptive family are different from the needs seen in infant or school-age adoptions. Yet few resources are available to deal with these special issues.

Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew

Sherrie Eldridge

As both an adoptee and president of Jewel Among Jewels Adoption Network, Eldridge brings an original approach to the topic of adoption. In an attempt to inform adoptive parents of the unique issues adoptees face, she discusses adoptee anger, mourning, and shame and adoption acknowledgment while using case studies to illustrate how parents can better relate to their adopted child. 

Hattie's Advocate

Mathew W. Hoffman & Krista Hoffman

This book is a witty and intriguing look into the world of foster care through the eyes of a foster parent. It breaks down the expectations and regulations that parents in foster care are faced with, and it touches on the problems in government policy that affect foster children. It does all this while thoroughly entertaining the reader. It is an indispensable resource for anyone considering adoption or foster care and a great read for just about anyone else.

Supporting An Adoption

Pat Holmes

This short, readable book gets straight to the point: Friends and Family often undermine adoptive parents' authority and parental role during the adjustment and attachment process. This causes immediate and long-term problems when we are building an attachment with children who have special attachment needs. This book explains what family and friends should expect during an adoption, how they can help, and how they can stay out of the way when there are problems. It explains some of the health, emotional and behavioral issues that are common to newly adopted children which are different from usual childrearing concerns. Adopted children need prepared and well-supported parents -- it is their most important special need. We NEED for our friends and family to understand what to expect, and this short book is perfect to help get the message through to those who may try to dismiss our concerns at a time when we need their understanding the most. I recommend this book to everyone who knows an adoptive family. I often tell my new adoptive-parent friends to buy 2 or 3 copies, one to keep and the others to hand out when needed. (I didn't get paid to say that, really!)

Review by A Customer

When Friends Ask About Adoption: Question & Answer Guide for Non-Adoptive Parents & Other Caring Adults

Linda Bothun

I disagree with the previous reviewer. I have found this a helpful little book to share with friends and family. It is especially helpful to those who have children who ask questions about their adopted friends. It allows those parents to answer the questions using the correct terminology and avoiding the myths of adoption. It is easy for the adoptive parent to customize to their family situation and preferences.

Review by A Customer

National Adoption Information Clearinghouse

Adoptive Families Magazine

Oregon Post Adoption Resource Center (ORPARC)

Child Welfare Information Gateway