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Twice a Daughter: A Search for Identity, Family, and Belonging

Category: Non-Fiction - Memoir
Author: Julie Ryan McGue
Publisher: She Writes Press
Publication Date: May 11, 2021
Number of Pages: 280
ISBN-10: 1647420504
ISBN-13: 978-1-64742-050-5

When Julie finds herself facing several health issues at the age of forty-eight, she must take a deep look into her past to find out her true family history. Julie and her sister are adopted twins and lack a proper health history and adoption documentation. This proves to become a huge problem for Julie who has serious medical issues. Together with her sister, Julie decides to locate her birth parents. When the sisters approach their adoptive parents with questions, they aren’t enthusiastic about their kids wanting to look for their birth parents. This is the first of many obstacles Julie faces as she spends eight long years with a search agency, a private investigator, an adoption agency, a genealogist, and a judge to uncover the secret behind her biological parents. Julie’s journey leads her to the medical history she sought and gives her answers to questions about her past that leave her astonished and floored!

Twice a Daughter: A Search for Identity, Family, and Belonging is a marvelous book about a woman seeking answers and struggling on the path of self-discovery. With courage, strength and never-ending compassion, this personal story about an adopted pair of sisters is told with grace. From wrestling with heartbreak, pain, rejection, and acceptance within oneself and the outside world, the book demonstrates the harsh realities faced by adoptees of a closed adoption. This memoir will take you on an emotional rollercoaster and move you to tears. A page-turning read that is as affecting as it is superbly written, this memoir is a page-turner. If you are looking for a warm and emotional holiday read, Twice a Daughter: A Search for Identity, Family, and Belonging is just the book for you!

Reviewed By: Romuald Dzemo

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Date: November 7, 2021

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