Rating: 
Summary: A Treasured Gift
Review: Kids like me in China gives the reader a glimpse into the often misunderstood and little known area of Chinese orphanages. Ying Ying Fry beautifully walks the reader through the orphanage starting with the infants and ending with the older children who live relatively ordinary lives. She also tells of time spent in a Chinese home with friends and a visit to a Chinese day school. Ying Ying's voice is one of friendship and discovery as she shares some of her thoughts and feelings of returning to the city of her early life. The photographs are brilliant and truthful. The book ends much too quickly. I look forward to more works from this truely amazing young woman and thank her with my whole heart for capturing a piece of China and adoptions that is rarely shared.
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Summary: By a Kid, for Kids - a MUST for China Adoptive Families
Review: Kids Like Me In China is absolutely fabulous, beautifully presented, very basic story of one child's visit to her land of birth and the orphanage where she was cared for as an infant, complete with photos that will touch the hearts of all who have travelled to China to make their family complete. It is all at once enchanting, realistic, touching, and upbeat. Personally, I got the added delight of discovering that author Ying Ying Fry is from the same part of China as my own daughter!! I recommend this book to every parent who is contemplating talking to their child about origins and adoption. It will serve as a valuable keepsake and aide in assisting our children to learn/understand/appreciate their very special story!! Congratulations to Ying Ying, who has a wonderful future in whatever she chooses to do!!
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Summary: The best yet -
Review: My 6 1/2 yr. old Chinese daughter is getting this for Christmas; she has been full of questions and emotional issues the past few months, relating to her adoption and time in China, and I almost cheered aloud upon reading Ying Ying's book. It is marvelous, and I KNOW my daughter will be both intrigued and comforted by Ying Ying's experience, explanations and interpretations. Thank you, Miss Fry, and thank YOU, Amy. This is lovely.Mindy Carney
mother of two kids like Ying Ying from China
Rating:
Summary: A Must Have Book on Chinese Adoption
Review: My daughter and I waited for this wonderful book and it was WELL worth it! It is hard to imagine that Ying Ying Fry is only eight years old. She writes with insight beyond her years. This beautiful written book that helps to explain to children about their adoption. The photos only add to this exceptional book. A book from the child's perspective makes for an exceptional read and a tearful reminder of our trip. If there was one book you had to have this would be it!
Rating:
Summary: Kids Like Me in China
Review: My seven year old and five year old daughters hung on every word of this book. The photos and text enabled them to ask many questions about their own lives in China. Ying Ying Fry has written an invaluable book for all children adopted overseas. So many kids wonder what would happen if they did go back or what life would have been like if they hadn't been adopted. This book gives a real life glimpse of life in an orphanage. Ying Ying is the perfect narrator for a journey that so many children take in their imaginations. I hope that you will purchase this book for your children and for everyone else in your life who wonders about orphanage life. This is one of the most important books on adoption in China ever published.
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Summary: Upbeat but frank: adopted child visits where she came from
Review: The book is very reminiscent of "When You Were Born in China." It's hardback, has lots of big pictures on every page, and has a relatively small amount of text. The big difference is that the pictures are in bright color. My (...) daughter was immediately taken with the book, and spent a long time paging through it, looking at the pictures. With me reading it to her, it takes about 30-45 minutes to read this book, without stopping to talk about the pictures much. The pictures are mostly of kids (all ages) and caregivers at the Changsha orphanage, where Ying Ying, the 8-year-old author, is from. The orphanage is in good shape: it has new cribs for the babies, bright new clothes for all the kids, etc. But there are lots and lots of those cribs to a room, and the text talks about how busy the ayis are, taking care of all the kids. There are frank pictures of special needs kids. There are also pictures of older kids at school (mostly giving performances, rather than
sitting at desks). And there are pictures at a kid's home, which could pass as an American home, complete with laptop computer. The text is upbeat, articulate, and frank. It's told from Ying Ying's point of view, in a child's "voice." She focuses on the positives in things, while explicitly acknowledging the negatives. Some quotes: "I was really excited and also a little scared." "I don't think the Ayis ever stop working. They hardly ever sit down." "Sometimes I think about [my birthmother]. But I don't talk about it much. Sometimes I just looked at all those babies in all those cribs and I didn't know what to think. Sometimes I just had to leave the room." "Sometimes when my parents were in another part of the orphanage, I'd go to my friends' rooms to play. It was different without my parents there. I talked more, and the kids asked me more questions: 'Do you like America? Do you like China? Do you like your parents?' Yes, yes, yes." There are a few pages that cover the reasons why there are so many kids in the orphanage, and why most of the
infants are girls. The author of the book is listed as Ying Ying Fry, "with Amy Klatzkin," her mother. I approached this a bit cautiously, because I've seen a little too much of parents putting words into their kids' mouths. The acknowledgements section addresses this explicitly: "The text was constructed from Ying Ying's journal, and from audiotapes, videotapes and interviews with her. The opinions, observations and questions are all hers, and she exercised final approval over the wording." We know Ying
Ying a little, not closely. I do think this seems like a good representation of what a girl like her would feel. While frank, the book represents a fundamentally upbeat outlook. I'm very happy to have this book for my daughter, who is also from China. While it addresses hard issues, it does it in a way that isn't going to create any trauma that a child doesn't already feel. On the contrary, the book shows an example of a kid who can think about hard things and still have a great outlook. A wonderful role model for my kid. As with "When You Were Born in China", I'd suggest this book for elementary-school aged kids.
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Summary: An informative and touching resource for our children
Review: This book gives us an inside look at an orphanage in Hunan Province and a young girl's homeland trip. It is full of big, color photographs from inside an orphanage, which is such a rare treat. Our 2 1/2 yr-old loves this book and loves all the pictures of the babies and the nannies. When it comes time to talk with our daughter about other issues surrounding her adoption, this book will be a valuable resource. In Ying Ying's own voice we hear about the one-child policy, infant abandonment and adoption.
"Kids Like Me in China" is a great book for children adopted from China and their siblings, cousins and friends. It can help adoptive parents bring up topics that may be difficult for us. It is a must-have!
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Summary: A must for your Adoption Library
Review: This book is priceless. It is written by an 8 year old girl, Ying Ying Fry, who is adopted from China. It is her story of going back to her orphanage in ChangSha, China to see and talk to kids in the orphange and learn about their life. My daughter is also adopted from ChangSha so this story held even more meaning. The words are Ying Ying's and they are powerful in her observations. The pictures of the children and of life in general in China also fill in gaps of what her life may have been like. This is a perfect gift for your child from China. We will treasure it for its glimpse it gave us of life in China. Thank you Ying Ying!
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Summary: Touching poetry
Review: This book is written with such clarity one would never imagine the observations were made by a very young girl! Combined with beautiful, touching and often very moving photos, Ying Ying's descriptions of how she felt reintegrating into her Chinese orphanage are empowering and gripping to the point of making the reader feel they too are there in the midst of the impoverished and understaffed mainland China institution. Ying Ying as a Chinese American is full of optimism and generosity for her fellow Chinese abandoned children, and her writing evokes much empathy for the reader to comprehend what life must be like in one of those orphanages. This book is worth a reader for kids and adults alike as it has aspects approachable for all readers! A real delight to read and look at.
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Summary: Focusing on the Things That Connect Us
Review: This is an extraordinarily moving and enlightening book. I am also an adoptive parent of children born in China but what the book is really about is the fact that there is more that connects us to the rest of the world than separates us. I received it shortly after Sept. 11 and was heartened by its implied insistence that the impulse to create bonds between people (and peoples) is, and will always be, stronger than the impulse to tear them apart. All of us and all of our children need to know this. Wonderfully felt, conceived, written and photographed.
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