Two Birthdays for Beth - Hardcover

Cronin, Gay Lynn; Bowring, Joanne

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0944934137 ISBN 13: 9780944934135

Publisher: Perspectives Pr, 1995

After waiting for months for a second birthday celebration because she is adopted, a young girl is initially disappointed--until she realizes how lucky she is

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From School Library Journal:

PreSchool-Grade 2?Mom tells Beth her "very own adoption story," saying, "You came from your birth mother's body and my heart," which makes the birth mother's experience sound more mechanical than it actually is. Then Mom describes the chocolate cake and presents with which she celebrated the day, June first, when "...you became my little girl." Beth thinks this means she will get two birthday parties a year?in January when she was born and in June. Readers wait with her through the seasons, but on June 1...no cake, no presents. Mom tells her that she has only one birthday, just like everybody else. She explains, "Adoption is different, but the love is the same. I don't love you because you're adopted. I love you because you're Beth." An adult reading this story aloud would get across the intended message, but children could use an inflection on the "I don't love you" sentence that would give it quite a different meaning. The pencil-sketch and pink-wash illustrations of the African American mother, child, and grandfather give no clue as to the child's age; the broadly smiling Beth on the cover and in the similar second illustration looks years older than the character in the rest of the book. African American adoptive families need a book of the quality of Betty Lifton's Tell Me a Real Adoption Story (Knopf, 1994), but this isn't it.?Nancy Schimmel, formerly of San Mateo County Library, CA
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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