A search for roots and identity has rarely been captured with such irony, unusual insight, and surprising humor as in this memoir of heartbreak and hope. Today a distinguished American poet, Colette Inez first came to the United States when she was eight years old, as an apparent Belgian orphan escorted by two complete strangers. Growing up in post–World War II America, a stranger to her own past, she survived a harrowing adolescence and an increasingly menacing, abusive adoptive family by learning to define her single solace: a developing passion for literature.
Facing possible deportation in the 1950s, Inez set out to prove her claim to U.S. citizenship. The result, as she recounts in this eloquent, wrenching memoir, would span two continents, a trail of discovery, and a buried secret: one that ultimately allowed Inez to reconcile her past and present and finally come of age as an artist.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Booklist
This memoir tells the elemental foundling drama about the search for home. Abandoned as an infant at a strict Belgian Catholic institution, Colette, 8, is adopted by a childless American couple in 1938 and brought across the sea to try and fix their failing marriage. It does not work, and when her adoptive mother dies and the husband remarries, the next stepmother is as brutal and abusive as those in any fairy tale. Inez grows up to be a successful poet and writing professor, and a happy wife, but always she is obsessed with finding her real parents--and finally she does. Although the writing is clear, this may be too long and detailed for many readers; but the family secrets and surprising revelations make it great material for writing classes. What is best is the lack of sentimentality and melodrama. There are no heartfelt embraces, only honesty about the discovery of who she is and what family means. Hazel Rochman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
“Colette Inez becomes the detective who must be shrewd and even deceptive to gain the truth about her origins. To say that her childhood was Dickensian almost seems an understatement, but she tells her story without self-pity, as if in writing it she can stand above or beyond her former self. A remarkable story of survival and discovery.”—James McConkey, author of Court of Memory and editor of The Anatomy of Memory
“Colette Inez spins a story whose themes are epic, but also intimate, personal, and entirely true. This is one of the loveliest, most heartfelt memoirs I’ve read, charting a woman’s search for her past and ultimately herself . . . in a transcendent celebration of wit and intellect.”—A. M. Homes, author of Things You Should Know and The Safety of Objects
"In this fabulous memoir, Colette Inez gives us a treat for all our senses. This is beautiful work."—Carolyn See, author of Making a Literary Life
“Colette Inez spins a story whose themes are epic, but also intimate, personal, and entirely true. This is one of the loveliest, most heartfelt memoirs I’ve read, charting a woman’s search for her past and ultimately herself . . . in a transcendent celebration of wit and intellect.”—A. M. Homes, author of Things You Should Know and The Safety of Objects
"In this fabulous memoir, Colette Inez gives us a treat for all our senses. This is beautiful work."—Carolyn See, author of Making a Literary Life
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Amazing and Gorgeous,
By Sharyn Wolf "Sharyn Wolf" (NY, NY United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Secret of M. Dulong: A Memoir (Wisconsin Studies in Autobiography) (Hardcover)
This exquisitely written memoir tells the story of the authors search for herself in a harsh and unloving world. Her poetry and warmth shine through, and I would highly recommend this heartfelt story to anyone who wants a brilliant piece of writing in their hands.
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