"Chosen" Children

"Re: 'Chosen' and not 'born.' ...Because of how adopters present this, I am one of many adoptees who pictured themselves at a supermarket with their adopters browsing the aisles of babies as they pushed their cart along. Adoption rhetoric doesn't allow for a story of our birth, a connection to humanity. No wonder so many of us felt we were aliens. I remember my adopters' natural son remarking, when my "chosen" story was told, "Yeah, you weren't born -- you were hatched!" My adopters never corrected him because they were incapable of even thinking about my actual birth, much less speaking of it. Ugh. being "chosen" by your adopters is NOTHING compared with being UNchosen by your own mother (which, despite the circumstances, is how most of us feel)." 
--posted by adoptee, Julie, on Adoption Insights Message Board 10/5/03

The free e-book at http://TheChosenChildren.com can be downloaded to browse or print.  The book, together with the web pages at http://AdoptedPrisoners.com and http://AdoptedKillers.com give a face and a voice to these "Gone But Not Forgotten" adoptees. 

Chosen Children is in 3 parts - Part I: The Problems--identifies the issues & follows the dollars to identify special interests; Part II: The Alternatives--identifies programs that work; Part III: The Chosen Children--identifies the victims & includes true case histories & in-depth stories of hundreds of incarcerated adoptees to reveal what makes their crimes unique...(the "why").

"True crime" books sensationalize the crime (the "what"), while Chosen Children provides the stories behind the stories (the "why"). The author, who has visited prisons, found an overrepresentation of adoptees among the 2-million who are incarcerated nationwide. She has researched hundreds of these adoptees from interviews, records, and correspondence and reunited many of them with their families. The book gives them a face and a voice for the first time, to show how the Foster Care & Adoption industries fuels the Prison industry & vice-versa.

The number of case histories in Chosen Children is the largest ever compiled in one book, & they are supported by excerpted newsclips, extensive data with sources & in-depth first-person narratives by incarcerated adoptees.

--Legal Eagle