This is a fairly recent instalment in Cathy Glass's many books about the children she has fostered, and quite topical in the context of recent controversy on social media about adoption versus abortion. I bought it to read and pass on to a friend who collects them, but as she already has this one, I decided to send it BookCrossing instead.

For a change, Cathy is asked to care for a newborn baby girl, Darcy-May, until suitable adoptive parents can be found, rather than being handed an older child who has been rescued from abuse, neglect or family disaster. It should be straightforward.

But Darcy-May's mother, fourteen-year-old Haylea, is herself a lonely, abused and suicidal child who desperately needs a loving family. Inevitably, Cathy winds up having to take responsibility for both girls until they can find permanent homes - and live with the fact that they are more like two unrelated children than a family group, as Haylea (very understandably under the circumstances) doesn't want anything to do with her daughter.

Surely, finding suitable adoptive parents for sweet, uncomplicated infant Darcy-May ought to be easier than finding a forever family who can help Haylea recover from her trauma? After all, there are far more couples who want to have a baby than there are babies available for adoption, especially cute, healthy, non-disabled babies without a history of abuse or drug addiction.

But of course, we know that it was easy and simple, it wouldn't take a whole book to tell the story. Those of us who wish that more people chose to adopt children, so that fewer women and girls felt the need to have an abortion if they aren't able to bring up their babies, need books like this and another of Glass's memoirs, Nobody's Son, as a reminder that even in this day and age, families who are passed as suitable to adopt aren't always as reliable as they seem.

I had bought this thinking to pass it on to a friend of mine, but it turned out that she already had it. So I donated this copy to the Community Library at Oakleaf Cafe.

Thanks, Temple!

Now gone from the shelves

Back on the shelves!