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Dear Reader,
Today's guest author, Mary Ellis, has written twenty-five novels, including Amish fiction, historical romance, and suspense. Sunset in Old Savannah, was a finalist for the Bookseller's Best Award and the Daphne du Maurier Award for mysteries. Before "retiring" to write full-time, Mary taught school and worked as a sales rep for Hershey Chocolate, a job with amazingly sweet fringe benefits. She enjoys traveling, gardening and bicycling, and lives in Ohio with her husband, dog and cat. Her latest title, book one of the Marked for Retribution Mysteries is, Hiding in Plain Sight.
Five ecopies of Mary Ellis' book Hiding in Plain Sight are ready to be electronically sent out to lucky book club readers. To enter the drawing, email using http://maryellis.net/contact/ (Please put DearReader on the subject line.)
Thoughts on Being Adopted
by Mary Ellis
Turn on a made-for-TV movie or one of those "reality" shows about adoption and you'll find adult children in serious angst over being given up. Everyone seems to be frantically searching for natural mothers and birth siblings. Invariably during the program's second segment, the viewer meets the long-suffering mother. Apparently the mother never stopped loving the baby taken from her or surrendered during a momentary lapse of judgment. Do I believe such situations exist in real life? Absolutely, I do. But are they the norm as the producers would have us believe? I'm not so sure. As a writer who was adopted from Children's Services as an infant, those stories have always rung false for me, or at least overly "Hollywood" dramatic.
I knew some adoptees who were disappointed or felt no connection whatsoever after discovering their "roots." Personally, I hold no grudge or hostility for the woman who gave me up, but I also possess no buried affection either. She is a stranger. Throughout my life I've been offended by the question: "Don't you want to know who your real mom is?" I always replied, "No, because I know who my real mother is--she's the one who wiped my runny nose, fixed my peanut butter sandwiches, and put up with my sassy mouth as a teenager. When asked: "Don't you think someday you might change your mind?" In the past I had stubbornly answered no.
But once I reached middle-age, I became less sure of myself. What if a natural sibling or parent needed a kidney or liver transplant and couldn't find a match in the general population? Would I deny them a chance to live because of old childhood loyalties? And on a more selfish level, what if I was the one needing a small part of someone's liver so I could enjoy more days on earth? Wouldn't I want to know how to reach them and give them the choice? I'm thankful I haven't needed a transplant thus far, but this situation happens every day.
In the subplot of my latest book, I chose to tackle this sensitive issue from the viewpoint of a biological sibling in need of an organ transplant. I hope you'll enjoy my mystery, Hiding in Plain Sight. While working to locate her adopted client's natural siblings, Kate Weller tries to prove her landlord's father not guilty of murder before someone who wants her dead tracks her down.
-- Mary Ellis
Email Mary, say hello, and when you do, you'll be entered in the drawing for an electronic copy of her new book, Hiding in Plain Sight. http://maryellis.net/contact/
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
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