Including More Than 450 Adoptee-Recommended Titles!

Adoptee Reading is a catalog of books written by adoptees along with other adoption-related books recommended by adoptees.

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  • Who’s Wally?: Adoption, Brian, and Me
    Who’s Wally?: Adoption, Brian, and Me
  • In Praise of Late Wonder
    In Praise of Late Wonder
  • Genetic Stigma in Law and Literature: Orphanhood, Adoption, and the Right to Reunion
    Genetic Stigma in Law and Literature: Orphanhood, Adoption, and the Right to Reunion

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  • A Duck – but Tall in the Water . . .

    A Duck – but Tall in the Water . . .

    Lesley was one of six children whose mother gave them all away. Fostered then adopted by people who were simply not fit for purpose she experienced a lot of pain… Read more

  • Adoption and Suicidality: An Anthology of Stories, Poems, and Resources for Adoptees, Families, Healthcare Professionals, and Allies

    Adoption and Suicidality: An Anthology of Stories, Poems, and Resources for Adoptees, Families, Healthcare Professionals, and Allies

    This book is a wake-up call to those impacted by adoption and to those who interact with them. According to preliminary results of a groundbreaking study out of Winston-Salem State… Read more


  • Who’s Wally?: Adoption, Brian, and Me

    Who’s Wally?: Adoption, Brian, and Me

    Andy Wallis was born as David in 1973; he was surplus to requirements and given up for adoption. Growing up, his adoption was never something he really thought about. It… Read more

  • A Duck – but Tall in the Water . . .

    A Duck – but Tall in the Water . . .

    Lesley was one of six children whose mother gave them all away. Fostered then adopted by people who were simply not fit for purpose she experienced a lot of pain… Read more


  • When the Ocean Flies

    When the Ocean Flies

    An email from a stranger tells Alison Earley that her natural father, whom she has known for only six years, has died suddenly. What begins as a short trip back… Read more

  • Second Choices: A Story of Belonging and Finding Home

    Second Choices: A Story of Belonging and Finding Home

    Elise, an adoptee, had always felt like a second choice. When she fell in love with and married Evan, she believed she was finally someone’s first choice. She longed for… Read more


  • Coloring & Journal Book For Adoptees With Motivational Quotes: For Adoptees Healing Journey – Volume 1

    Coloring & Journal Book For Adoptees With Motivational Quotes: For Adoptees Healing Journey – Volume 1

    As an adult adoptee that struggles with the seven core issues of being adopted, (loss, rejection, guilt and shame, grief, identity, intimacy, and mastery/control), I have created this therapeutic coloring book with motivational uplifting quotes and affirmations, original illustrations and patterns, and journaling pages to… Read more

  • Swear, Vent & Coloring Book For (very) F*cking Angry Adoptees: For Adoptees Healing Journey – Volume 1

    Swear, Vent & Coloring Book For (very) F*cking Angry Adoptees: For Adoptees Healing Journey – Volume 1

    Why an angry sweary coloring and journal book? Because punching people in the face is frowned upon, and anger isn’t great for your overall mental and physical health if you hold on to it–so just let it all out! As an adult adoptee that struggles… Read more

  • Truth and Agency: Writing Ideas For People Who Were Adopted

    Truth and Agency: Writing Ideas For People Who Were Adopted

    In order to feel fully rooted, it’s important to know your story. If your personal narrative starts “The day we got you,” then you are already in the gaslit land of the uprooted. It can be a struggle to feel fully human when you don’t… Read more


  • Adoption Unfiltered: Revelations from Adoptees, Birth Parents, Adoptive Parents, and Allies

    Adoption Unfiltered: Revelations from Adoptees, Birth Parents, Adoptive Parents, and Allies

    Adoption Unfiltered authors Sara Easterly (adoptee), Kelsey Vander Vliet Ranyard (birth parent), and Lori Holden (adoptive parent) interview dozens of adoptees, birth parents, adoptive parents, social workers, therapists, and other allies–all sharing candidly about the challenges in adoption. While finding common ground in the sometimes-contentious… Read more

  • Adoption Fantasies: The Fetishization of Asian Adoptees from Girlhood to Womanhood

    Adoption Fantasies: The Fetishization of Asian Adoptees from Girlhood to Womanhood

    In Adoption Fantasies, Kimberly D. McKee explores the ways adopted Asian women and girls are situated at a nexus of objectifications—as adoptees and as Asian American women—and how they negotiate competing expectations based on sensationalist and fictional portrayals of adoption found in US popular culture. McKee… Read more

  • Adult Adoptees and Writing to Heal: Migrating Toward Wholeness

    Adult Adoptees and Writing to Heal: Migrating Toward Wholeness

    We live in a world where conversations about trauma are becoming commonplace and adopted people are using their voices to educate the general public about the effects of maternal separation and genealogical bewilderment. But for many adult adoptees the act of speaking truth to power… Read more


  • Adoption and Suicidality: An Anthology of Stories, Poems, and Resources for Adoptees, Families, Healthcare Professionals, and Allies

    Adoption and Suicidality: An Anthology of Stories, Poems, and Resources for Adoptees, Families, Healthcare Professionals, and Allies

    This book is a wake-up call to those impacted by adoption and to those who interact with them. According to preliminary results of a groundbreaking study out of Winston-Salem State… Read more

  • When We Become Ours: A YA Adoptee Anthology

    When We Become Ours: A YA Adoptee Anthology

    There is no universal adoption experience, and no two adoptees have the same story. This anthology for teens edited by Shannon Gibney and Nicole Chung contains a wide range of… Read more


  • Mirrors Made of Ink

    Mirrors Made of Ink

    A collection of sixty poems spanning moments across a lifetime, Mirrors Made of Ink focuses on the emotional catastrophe of adoption. Quist muses with varied style on family, existence, and the liminal… Read more

  • Going Unarmed Into the Wail

    Going Unarmed Into the Wail

    Going Unarmed Into the Wail is an intense, intimate chapbook that wrestles with what it is to be a product of the adoption-industrial complex. With rich visuals, the poems in this… Read more


  • The Girl I Am, Was, and Never Will Be: A Speculative Memoir of Transracial Adoption

    The Girl I Am, Was, and Never Will Be: A Speculative Memoir of Transracial Adoption

    Part memoir, part speculative fiction, this novel explores the often surreal experience of growing up as a mixed-Black transracial adoptee. Dream Country author Shannon Gibney returns with a new book woven… Read more

  • Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller

    Everyone Hates Kelsie Miller

    There’s no one Kelsie Miller hates more than Eric Mulvaney Ortiz—the homecoming king, captain of the football team, and academic archrival in her hyper-competitive prep school. But after Kelsie’s best… Read more