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Chicken Soup for the Adopted Soul: Stories Celebrating Forever Families
Chicken Soup for the Adopted Soul will touch your heart with stories of finding and creating families. From tales about international orphaned babies and children who spent years in the foster-care system to those who were adopted at birth, this very special compilation conveys the true meaning of unconditional love.
Read a moving letter from a birth mother to her son explaining how difficult it was to give him up when she didn't have the means to care for him, how she still thinks about him often, and how she will always love him. Read stories from now-grown children and even those from the Vietnam Operation Babylift in 1975. Through their stories, you will delight in meeting happy, well-adjusted, grateful members of families and society.
Find hope in stories of infertile couples who are given the gift of parenthood, adopted children who thrive and find joy in life, and older couples given a second chance at family. Chicken Soup for the Adopted Soul provides insight into what adoption is all about and what it's really like to be adopted. Share in our celebration of the lives of adopted children who found forever families and parents who found forever love.
Read a moving letter from a birth mother to her son explaining how difficult it was to give him up when she didn't have the means to care for him, how she still thinks about him often, and how she will always love him. Read stories from now-grown children and even those from the Vietnam Operation Babylift in 1975. Through their stories, you will delight in meeting happy, well-adjusted, grateful members of families and society.
Find hope in stories of infertile couples who are given the gift of parenthood, adopted children who thrive and find joy in life, and older couples given a second chance at family. Chicken Soup for the Adopted Soul provides insight into what adoption is all about and what it's really like to be adopted. Share in our celebration of the lives of adopted children who found forever families and parents who found forever love.
365 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1998
About the author
Jack Canfield
1,308 books1,769 followersJack Canfield is an American motivational speaker and author. He is best known as the co-creator of the "Chicken Soup for the Soul" book series, which currently has over 124 titles and 100 million copies in print in over 47 languages. According to USA Today, Canfield and his writing partner, Mark Victor Hansen, were the top-selling authors in the United States in 1997.
Canfield received a BA in Chinese History from Harvard University and a Masters from University of Massachusetts. He has worked as a teacher, a workshop facilitator, and a psychotherapist.
Canfield is the founder of "Self Esteem Seminars" in Santa Barbara, and "The Foundation for Self Esteem" in Culver City, California. The stated mission of Self Esteem Seminars is to train entrepreneurs, educators, corporate leaders and employees to achieve their personal and professional goals. The focus of The Foundation for Self Esteem is to train social workers, welfare recipients and human resource professionals.
In 1990,he shared with author Mark Victor Hansen his idea for the Chicken Soup for the Soul series. After three years, the two had compiled sixty-eight stories.
Canfield has appeared on numerous television shows, including Good Morning America, 20/20, Eye to Eye, CNN's Talk Back Live, PBS, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Montel Williams Show, Larry King Live and the BBC.
Canfield's most recent book, The Success Principles (2005), shares 64 principles that he claims can make people more successful. In 2006, he appeared in the DVD, "The Secret," and shared his insights on the Law of Attraction and tips for achieving success in personal and professional life.
Jack Canfield was born on August 19, 1944, in Fort Worth, TX. He is the son of Elmer and Ellen (a homemaker; maiden name, Taylor). He attended high school at Linsly Military Institute, Wheeling, WV, 1962. He went to college at Harvard University, B.A., 1966; University of Massachusetts at Amherst, M.Ed., 1973. Canfield married Judith Ohlbaum in 1971 (divorced, November 1976); he married Georgia Lee Noble on September 9, 1978 (divorced, December 1999); he married Inga Marie Mahoney on July 4, 2001; children: (first marriage) Oran, David, Kyle, Dania; (second marriage) Christopher Noble. He is a Democrat and a Christian, and his hobbies include tennis, travel, skiing, running, billiards, reading, and guitar.
Canfield received a BA in Chinese History from Harvard University and a Masters from University of Massachusetts. He has worked as a teacher, a workshop facilitator, and a psychotherapist.
Canfield is the founder of "Self Esteem Seminars" in Santa Barbara, and "The Foundation for Self Esteem" in Culver City, California. The stated mission of Self Esteem Seminars is to train entrepreneurs, educators, corporate leaders and employees to achieve their personal and professional goals. The focus of The Foundation for Self Esteem is to train social workers, welfare recipients and human resource professionals.
In 1990,he shared with author Mark Victor Hansen his idea for the Chicken Soup for the Soul series. After three years, the two had compiled sixty-eight stories.
Canfield has appeared on numerous television shows, including Good Morning America, 20/20, Eye to Eye, CNN's Talk Back Live, PBS, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Montel Williams Show, Larry King Live and the BBC.
Canfield's most recent book, The Success Principles (2005), shares 64 principles that he claims can make people more successful. In 2006, he appeared in the DVD, "The Secret," and shared his insights on the Law of Attraction and tips for achieving success in personal and professional life.
Jack Canfield was born on August 19, 1944, in Fort Worth, TX. He is the son of Elmer and Ellen (a homemaker; maiden name, Taylor). He attended high school at Linsly Military Institute, Wheeling, WV, 1962. He went to college at Harvard University, B.A., 1966; University of Massachusetts at Amherst, M.Ed., 1973. Canfield married Judith Ohlbaum in 1971 (divorced, November 1976); he married Georgia Lee Noble on September 9, 1978 (divorced, December 1999); he married Inga Marie Mahoney on July 4, 2001; children: (first marriage) Oran, David, Kyle, Dania; (second marriage) Christopher Noble. He is a Democrat and a Christian, and his hobbies include tennis, travel, skiing, running, billiards, reading, and guitar.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
February 2, 2013
Because I'm adopted, I really enjoyed this book; I could relate so well to it. Makes me want to meet my birthparents!!! It also really makes me appreciate the fact that my parents adopted me at 3 months old. I wonder what my life would've been like, had they not chosen me. It was good for me to read stories from others who are adopted, & also to read the perspectives of the birthmothers who gave their babies up for adoption.
July 12, 2012
One of the lamer Chicken Soup for the Soul books if you can believe it. Even for someone who is an admitted mush this book is so full of sacharine that it makes you gag.
August 4, 2024
I bought this sort of as a joke and then ended up reading it so I didn't feel like I had wasted my money. But it is I think one of the worst offenders in the chicken soup lineup. I have on occasion read books like Chicken soup for the pet lover's soul because I wanted something easy and digestible to take my mind off whatever was going on. This book however I feel could be actively harmful to an adopted child or a child in foster care. Multiple times the adoption of a child is compared and mirrored in the story by the adoption of a dog. Multiple times the concept of God using the womb of some third world dwelling mother as a surrogate for a child's actual more Christian mother is explicitly stated. It's just gross, I don't even know what I'm going to do with this book I don't want to put it in a free library or donate it. I don't want to think about someone reading it earnestly. Maybe the recycling bin.
December 31, 2021
Great short stories about adoption
October 22, 2022
Good set of stories. Some brought tears to my eyes.
November 18, 2025
Là các câu chuyện nhỏ về những người nhận con nuôi/ là con nuôi.
February 20, 2017
It seems to me that books in the Chicken Soup series are getting lower in quality. Overall, I would say that, although most stories are interesting and emotional, they are so similar in content that they become almost tedious to read.
But most disappointing is the writing style. To me, this book reads like a factual recounting of experiences rather than intensely emotional experiences. There are stories in the book which I have heard before which were so exciting that I still remember them decades later. But the same stories recounted here just seem to lack the excitement and drama.
I think that better authors or editors are needed now in this series.
I am not meaning to minimize the trauma and emotions and drama experienced by families giving up their children, or having mothers back out of the agreement at childbirth, or of infertile parents spending thousands of dollars and agonizing waits hoping for a child, or of the reunions of mothers and the children they gave up for adoption.
I am simply saying that if it were my story being told, I would want someone to communicate better my experience so that the readers could relate to me and empathize.
Overall, I have been disappointed by the more recent books in this series. I had to force myself to read to the end of this book. Too bad, because these books used to be very inspirational.
But most disappointing is the writing style. To me, this book reads like a factual recounting of experiences rather than intensely emotional experiences. There are stories in the book which I have heard before which were so exciting that I still remember them decades later. But the same stories recounted here just seem to lack the excitement and drama.
I think that better authors or editors are needed now in this series.
I am not meaning to minimize the trauma and emotions and drama experienced by families giving up their children, or having mothers back out of the agreement at childbirth, or of infertile parents spending thousands of dollars and agonizing waits hoping for a child, or of the reunions of mothers and the children they gave up for adoption.
I am simply saying that if it were my story being told, I would want someone to communicate better my experience so that the readers could relate to me and empathize.
Overall, I have been disappointed by the more recent books in this series. I had to force myself to read to the end of this book. Too bad, because these books used to be very inspirational.
October 25, 2011
If you want to be moved by true stories, you have to read any Chicken Soup. This book, as all of them always are, is tender and made shed several tears...especially the poem of Lisa Schlitt (I read this book in spanish, the title was 'A boy like me?')
April 10, 2012
Very nice compilation of adoption-related stories. I just read a couple of these stories at a time. Some were very good, others okay, and a few I really didn't care for. The last part: Reunions, I really enjoyed!
July 19, 2012
I haven't met a Chicken Soup book I haven't enjoyed, but this one has several tear-jerking stories. This gives a first person account of the adoption experience from the view of adoptees and their adoptive parents. Very insightful.
April 22, 2008
This was a warm, fuzzy feel good book. Not a lot of depth, but nice stories on how families are formed by adoption. A good read for adoptive families. Doesnt explain the adoption process itself.
August 27, 2009
A wonderful collection of people's experiences with adoption, from the stress of waiting until the excitement of becoming a family.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews