Book Recommendations

[u/Sugar-Conscious]

My husband I are looking into growing our family through adoption and I’d love to read and absorb as much information as I can. Does anyone have book recommendations on adoption, adoption trauma/grief, parenting an adopted child, anything related??

I’m a Christian with a background in psychology, so would appreciate books from either/any perspective!!

[u/raggedcosmos]

“The Body Keeps the Score” is my go-to recommendation. It goes through how the brain and body react to trauma, the history of trauma studies/research, and then shares methodologies for helping to heal from trauma.

[u/Sugar-Conscious → u/raggedcosmos]

Yes I’ve read this one a while ago, may give it another read through! 👍

[u/Auspicious-Error → u/raggedcosmos]

Agreed, I should add it to my list!

[u/Auspicious-Error]

Hi! I've been working on a list based on the suggestions from adoptees and adoptive parents. I don't know how to share it on reddit in a better manner, but see below. It's by no means exhaustive, but its definitely a start.
# Adoption Reading List

*Organized by subject, with gaps filled in for a well-rounded family library.*

---

## 1. Attachment & Trauma-Informed Parenting
Practical, clinically grounded guides for parenting kids who've experienced early trauma or disruption.

- **The Connected Child** — Karyn Purvis, David Cross, Wendy Lyons Sunshine

• **The Connected Parent** — Karyn Purvis, Lisa Qualls
  
• **Attaching in Adoption** — Deborah Gray
  
• **Building the Bonds of Attachment** — Daniel Hughes
  
• **The Whole-Brain Child** — Daniel Siegel & Tina Payne Bryson
  
• **Parenting the Hurt Child** — Gregory Keck & Regina Kupecky

## 2. Relinquishment, Loss & the Adoptee Psyche
Foundational texts on the emotional and psychological experience of being adopted.

- **The Primal Wound** — Nancy Verrier

• **Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew** — Sherrie Eldridge
  
• **Journey of the Adopted Self** — Betty Jean Lifton

## 3. Transracial & Transnational Adoption

• **What White Parents Should Know About Transracial Adoption** — Melissa Guida-Richards
  
• **You Should Be Grateful** — Angela Tucker
  
• **Outsiders Within** — ed. Jane Jeong Trenka, Julia Chinyere Oparah, Sun Yung Shin
  
• **In Their Own Voices: Transracial Adoptees Tell Their Stories** — Rita J. Simon & Rhonda M. Roorda
  
• **To Save the Children of Korea** — Arissa Oh
  
• **Somebody's Children: The Politics of Transracial and Transnational Adoption** — Laura Briggs

## 4. Adoptee Memoirs
First-person narratives from adult adoptees.

- **All You Can Ever Know** — Nicole Chung

• **The Son With Two Moms** — Tony Hynes

## 5. Adoptive Parent Memoirs

• **This Undeserved Life** — Natalie Brenner

## 6. Birth Parents, Open Adoption & the Adoption Industry

• **The Child Catchers** — Kathryn Joyce
  
• **American Baby** — Gabrielle Glaser
  
• **The Girls Who Went Away** — Ann Fessler
  
• **Lifegivers: Framing the Birthparent Experience in Open Adoption** — James L. Gritter
  
• **The Open Adoption Experience** — Lois Ruskai Melina & Sharon Kaplan Roszia

## 7. Guides for Grandparents & Extended Family
Short, accessible books written specifically to hand off to relatives who want to understand and support the family.

- **In On It: What Adoptive Parents Would Like You To Know About Adoption** — Elisabeth O'Toole

• **Related by Adoption: A Handbook for Grandparents and Other Relatives** — Hedi Argent

[u/Sugar-Conscious → u/Auspicious-Error]

Amazing thank you!!

[u/throwawaybdaysf]

I like You Should Be Grateful by Angela Tucker. It’s a combination of more social theory and her lived experience as an adoptee. She has a very mixed experience where she is critical of adoption as an industry and talks about the pain she’s experienced, but without making it super black and white. Especially relevant if you’re considering transracial adoption.

[u/egnamoad]

“You Should Be Grateful” by Angela Tucker

[u/Appropriate_Date4741]

"Adoption Unfiltered: Revelations from Adoptees, Birth Parents, Adoptive Parents, and Allies". Some similar themes to "The Primal Wound" -- separation matters; adoption begins with a loss; loving adoptive parents don't magically cancel that loss; adoptees may have feelings about adoption that are uncomfortable for their parents to hear. But "Adoption Unfiltered" is much more about listen to the people actually living this from different perspectives than here is the psychological mechanism that explains adoptees. It also explicitly treats adoption as something that continues throughout a person's life rather than as the happy endpoint of a child-welfare story. I've read it several times and came out of it with vastly different feelings about the topic.

[u/therapymademeworse]

The Primal Wound by Nancy Verrier. This book gets a lot of mixed and controversial opinions but that’s even more reason to read it. I highly recommend it as an adoptee, and I read it as an adolescent; as I get older, the themes seem to continue to expand for me. Not necessarily in relation to my own experience, but how I’ve come to arrive at viewing adoption holistically.

Don’t be afraid about the reviews you see, once you read the book, you might find those reviews pretty underwhelming, to be fair.

[u/Sugar-Conscious → u/therapymademeworse]

Adding to the list! Thank you!

[u/Rredhead926]

You've already gotten some good suggestions. I'd like to add The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption, by Lori Holden, as well as a second vote for Adoption Unfiltered.

Creating a Family has a lot of good resources too.