Black Baby White Hands: A View from the Crib

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Summary: This is an extremely powerful and beautifully written book.
Review: As a child welfare professional and advocate, I believe that this book can serve as a wonderful learning tool for parents seeking to adopt children of different cultures/races. All Social Workers would also greatly benefit from reading it. As a transracial adoptee, this book truly validated many of my experiences growing up in a world that was socially and emotionally challenging, and often made very little sense to me. Dr. John can serve as a role model for many because he has worked tirelessly to search for, and grow from, the meaning behind his experiences. Through his storytelling, he also shares his life with us in a manner that honors all of his family members. I highly recommend reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: This is an extremely powerful and beautifully written book.
Review: As a child welfare professional and advocate, I believe that this book can serve as a wonderful learning tool for parents seeking to adopt children of different cultures/races. All Social Workers would also greatly benefit from reading it. As a transracial adoptee, this book truly validated many of my experiences growing up in a world that was socially and emotionally challenging, and often made very little sense to me. Dr. John can serve as a role model for many because he has worked tirelessly to search for, and grow from, the meaning behind his experiences. Through his storytelling, he also shares his life with us in a manner that honors all of his family members. I highly recommend reading this book.

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Summary: Life-Affirming ........
Review: As a white adoptive mother of black children I felt privileged to be invited on Jaiya John's journey and I am grateful for its experience for our children's sake. As someone who loves to read I enjoyed an eloquently written memoir that reads like an intricate novel and is a courageous and graceful testimony to the necessity of honoring life's truths. I want to thank the author for his generosity and for so beautifully illustrating that the stories of race and adoption cannot be told in a vacuum.

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Summary: An exceptional read!
Review: Black Baby White Hands is truly a treasure! Dr. John has so eloquently and generously shared with us his story of being African-American and raised by white parents. Through all the emotions that Dr. John experienced with such intensity due to this (seemingly) unusual family dynamic, what comes through on every page is the unyielding love that he and his family share with one another. Black Baby White Hands has become one of my favorite books. Though at times upsetting, this volume was both poetic and melodic in its telling and I am absolutely thrilled to have found a book that I've embraced so fully! Thank you Dr. John for your generosity!

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Summary: Thank you, Jaiya, for sharing your soul...
Review: Black Baby White Hands: A View from the Crib by Dr. Jaiya John touched my soul. It is a journey into the world of a child who was a stranger surrounded by well meaning adoptive parents who were unable to reach the depth of his heart and soul. As you read his book, you move through the depth of a range of emotions and emerge with a hope that armed with sensitivity and knowledge, there is a future for the children caught up in the system. Prior to adopting my first child 25 years ago, I read a book about the account of an adoptee. That story enabled me to prepare myself for how my children might feel being adopted. Dr. John's book is the "Transracial Adoption Bible" sorely needed in this arena. As a transracial adoptive parent, adoption worker and trainer, "Black Baby" has become required reading for those families that I work with or train who desire to parent transracially. When I train prospective aodptive parents, all of them indicate that they want the best for their children. If we look at ourselves honestly, we realize we cannot be everything to our child. Jaiya's poignant life journey compels us to shed our color-blind ideas and recognize we live in a race conscious society that will see color and react according to preconceived notions. We cannot protect our children forever; we must give them the tools to survive in this society. For those who have or are considering adopting transracially, once you read "Black Baby", you will have walked in Jaiya's shoes and you cannot help but come away enlightened and armed with the knowledge you need to do right by the children you love so much. Thank you, Jaiya, for sharing your soul. We need you in this field "It takes a whole village to raise a child."

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Summary: Kudos
Review: Dr. Jaiya John is an incredibly talented author who eloquently describes his feelings as a minority child raised in a white environment.He also conveys the importance of validation of those feelings and describes a child's struggle for self identity. There are lessons for all in this impressive testimony of struggle and fullfillment."Black Baby White Hands" has the power to change the way we perceive and validate our children.Kudos to you, Dr. John! I look forward to your next book!

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Summary: An incredible and thought provoking read
Review: Hands down, Black Baby White Hands, is the most prolific book that I've read on the topic of trans-racial adoption. Without condemning or judging, Jaiya John shares his perspective from a first hand experience. This book will challenge people on all sides of the issue to stop and consider things that they have yet to. And beyond just dealing with the central issue of trans-racial adoption, in recounting his experience, John also touches on other very serious issues. As a Black man who grew up in a small white town, I found my own story being told in parts of this work. No doubt, each reader will step away from this book taking something more than they were expecting. John conveys all of this powerful emotion with the most beautiful of prose, that reveal his poetic roots. This book should be required reading for all of the national policy makers who are currently attempting to decide the fate of our children in the system.

Rating:
Summary: An incredible and thought provoking read
Review: Hands down, Black Baby White Hands, is the most prolific book that I've read on the topic of trans-racial adoption. Without condemning or judging, Jaiya John shares his perspective from a first hand experience. This book will challenge people on all sides of the issue to stop and consider things that they have yet to. And beyond just dealing with the central issue of trans-racial adoption, in recounting his experience, John also touches on other very serious issues. As a Black man who grew up in a small white town, I found my own story being told in parts of this work. No doubt, each reader will step away from this book taking something more than they were expecting. John conveys all of this powerful emotion with the most beautiful of prose, that reveal his poetic roots. This book should be required reading for all of the national policy makers who are currently attempting to decide the fate of our children in the system.

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Summary: A tour de force!
Review: Here is an astounding literary achievement where poetry and music of the soul come to the written page. It's so remarkably rare to find a biography rich in colour, texture on a voyage of discovery. His use of metaphor unparalleled. I do hope we have more from the pen of Jaiya John.

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Summary: Courageous words spoken for our children.
Review: I am a single white mother of an adopted black daughter living in a small, predominately white, southern town. As Jaiya's life journey unfolded across the pages, I heard my daughter's voice speak to me from her crib. The words I heard were my fears that keep me awake at night. By sharing his life, Jaiya brings to light the responsibility that we (as adults who have chosen a transracial family) have to embrace, respect, love and consiously integrate the culture, origin of birth and race of our children. Thank you Jaiya for courageously speaking for our children. May their lives be blessed.