Death by adoption [Paperback]

Joss Shawyer (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 291 pages
• Publisher: Cicada (1979)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0908599021
• ISBN-13: 978-0908599028
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,703,807 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Truth, May 10, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Death by adoption (Paperback)

Finally--finally after years of seeing this book referenced I own a copy. And it was worth the search. Shawyer's honest and compassionate look at adoption through the eyes of an astute, woman-friendly observer, is a stunner.

Social workers and doctors made a mistake when they targeted Shawyer and her twin babies for adoption fodder. She was not frightened by these "adoption police" who have destroyed millions and millions of perfectly good real families in the last fifty years. Shawyer resisted their date-rape style abuse. She describes vividly how the mother targeted for adoption keeps saying "no" to the suggestion of adoption for her child yet the social workers and doctors who have singled her out as fair game keep saying "yes." Ultimately, they simply whisk away the newborn for baby-crazed infertiles and tell the mother who complains that it is her fault that she didn't stop them. When this trickery was tried on Shawyer, she found the shaming and cult-like brainwashing tactics ludicrous, was able to fight off the attacks, and walked out of the hospital with her babies as God intended.

Ever since, she has stood up for mothers and their precious babies. She documents well the terrible suffering of adoption's victims, the unresolvable grief and post-truamatic stress disorder--ruined lives. After writing Death by Adoption, Shawyer was instrumental in the dismantling of the mean and shameful practice in New Zealand.

I was shocked to look in the front of Death By Adoption and see it was written 25 years ago. One suspects that Shawyer must be dismayed that after all these years with the horrors of adoption well-documented, it seems to be business as usual in the US for these appalling human rights violations.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Death by Adoption, December 21, 2002

By 

P. Ann Evans (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Death by adoption (Paperback)

Though the author is not from the U.S., this book speaks to birthmothers in many parts of the world, especially those in the U.S. This book was written when there was almost nothing available to tell the birthmothers' side of adoption! I was able to get it through interlibrary loan. Shawyer's words helped me greatly when I began the Search for my son Paul. The author was one of the pioneers in exposing the pain of adoption. I give Shawyer five stars for courage. The book is not a skimpy one, says a lot, and deserves five stars!

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Incredibly Insightful, October 17, 2001

By 

"offred68" (Spokane, WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Death by adoption (Paperback)

This book gives one of the most realistic perspective on adoption from a mothers perpspective that I've ever read. The only people who seem to benefit from adoption are the people who adopt, they lose nothing and no one. Death by Adoption has been saying truthful about the Emporer's new clothes for a long time. One of the few books to show adoption from the point of view of those who lose their family to adoption. A must read!!!!