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Avg. Customer Rating:(based on 67 reviews) Sales Rank: 298399 Category: Book
Author:Karin Evans Publisher:Tarcher Studio:Tarcher Manufacturer:Tarcher Label:Tarcher Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published) Media: Paperback Number Of Items: 1 Pages: 400 Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8 Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.4 x 1.1
Product Description In 1997 journalist Karin Evans walked into an orphanage in southern China and met her new daughter, a beautiful one-year-old baby girl. In this fateful moment Evans became part of a profound, increasingly common human drama that links abandoned Chinese girls with foreigners who have traveled many miles to complete their families.
At once a compelling personal narrative and an evocative portrait of contemporary China, The Lost Daughters of China has also served as an invaluable guide for thousands of readers as they navigated the process of adopting from China. However, much has changed in terms of the Chinese government?s policies on adoption since this book was originally published and in this revised and updated edition Evans addresses these developments. Also new to this edition is a riveting chapter in which she describes her return to China in 2000 to adopt her second daughter who was nearly three at the time. Many of the first girls to be adopted from China are now in the teens (China only opened its doors to adoption in the 1990s), and this edition includes accounts of their experiences growing up in the US and, in some cases, of returning to China in search of their roots.
Illuminating the real-life stories behind the statistics, The Lost Daughters of China is an unforgettable account of the red thread that winds form China?s orphanages to loving families around the globe.
Amazon.com Review The Lost Daughters of China is that rare book that can be many things to different people. Part memoir, part travelogue, part East-West cultural commentary, and part adoption how-to, Karin Evans's book is greater than the sum of its parts. Evans weaves together her experience of adopting a Chinese infant with observations about Chinese women's history and that country's restrictive, if unevenly enforced, reproductive policies. She and her husband adopted Kelly Xiao Yu in 1997, and anyone curious about adopting from a Chinese orphanage--which houses girls and disabled boys--will learn about the mechanics and the emotional freight of the two-year process. Borrowing an image from Chinese folklore, Evans conveys herself, her husband, and their daughter as tethered by a red string that yoked them across an ocean and an equally awesome cultural divide.
The elegant prose is spiced with bits of ironic cultural dissonance. A discount shopper, Evans "felt more than a little strange buying China-made [baby] clothes with which to bundle up a tiny baby, one of China's own, and bring her home." On a bus tour through southern China, she is one of a "bunch of Americans with Chinese infants singing 'Que Sera Sera' in the middle of a sea of traffic. Will she be happy?Will she be rich?" To suddenly hear Doris Day over the horns of a Kowloon traffic jam is heady stuff indeed.
The Lost Daughters of China is at its best when describing Evans's tally of emotional loss and gain. At one point the bureaucratic adoption process is unaccountably delayed, but her father dies during that time and she's able to sit by his bedside. The most mysterious example of this emotional calculus is Kelly's birth mother. Evans invents many plausible scenarios that caused this unknown woman to abandon her three-month-old daughter at a market. These incomplete, necessarily provisional stories help give a face to the larger cultural processes that compel new parents to abandon 1.7 million girl babies annually. The stuff of headlines--human rights, infanticide, rural and urban poverty--is rendered personally relevant in Evans's compelling book. --Kathi Inman Berens
If you are planning to adopt from China, this is the book for you! June 17, 2008 0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This was an interesting book for those that might be planning to adopt from China. It talks about the history of girls in China, and some laws, etc. She also went over the process for them. It was good, but I was wanting a little more of a memoir. It gives you a lot of info. on adoption in China, that's for sure!
informative read, if slightly repetitive February 20, 2008 0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I enjoyed this book. For someone who is considering adoption from China, it was very helpful and moving to read about the experience from one who has been there.
I did find however, that the book was slightly repetitive. There seemed to be a lot of "Women are forced to give up their daughters so that they can have sons..." and "Women were forced to abort if they went over the one child rule..." and "Having a son is more important than anything on the planet"...over and over and over. I understood that after the first chapter. But each chapter seemed to repeat this in different words.
I really appreciated the author's personal story. She was honest and real about the anxieties involved in this process, including the huge financial cost of adopting from China. She also made clear the joys of adoption from China. We got an honest look at both sides of the coin.
Overall it was a well written and informative book. I'm glad I bought it used though. :)
Eye Opening! November 25, 2007 1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This book is very eye opening. Evans paints such a clear picture of the problem with the one child policy in China while at the same time telling the story of her journey to adopt a daughter from China. This book was both heart wrenching and heart warming. After reading this book, I felt as thought I had just experienced a long talk with a close friend about her personal adoption story.
This book is great information for everyone, not just those interested in international adoption.
I was so nieve before reading this book! August 21, 2007 1 out of 1 found this review helpful
All I can say about this book is that it really opened my eyes. A couple times while reading I thought to myself, "Could this be real?" The statistics and information given in this book are mind blowing. The book delivers the information in an organized, easy to understand way. After reading so much about the adoption process it was a nice change to read about the culture my child will be coming from. I gained historical and political perspective as well a real understanding about the way things "actually" are in China. I have to say that anyone adopting a Chinese daughter should read this book. I can only imagine it will also help me answer some questions that may arrise as my daughter grows.
Very Educational! May 16, 2007 1 out of 1 found this review helpful
A must read. Very informative on China and how the adoption process came to be what it is today & why. Sad and heartbreaking at the same time. Did not agree w/all aspects (belief system of author) but apart from that, it is a really good book.
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