From the Bookshelf of Diversity in All Forms!…

Before We Were Yours

Lisa Wingate

Start date: January 1, 2019

Finish date: January 28, 2019

Discussion: Monthly Group Reads

Why we're reading this: Before We Were Yours

January: Free-For-All
[close] Before We Were Yours

January: Free-For-All

Find A Copy At

Libraries

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 74 topics — 1,387 comments total

Monthly Group Reads

Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents (June 2021)
By Mariah Roze · 7 posts · 65 views

last updated Feb 12, 2024 09:45AM

The Help (March 2023)
By Mariah Roze · 4 posts · 22 views

last updated Mar 06, 2023 09:46AM

What Members Thought

Apr 09, 2018 Candace rated it really liked it · review of another edition

This novel is written in two timelines -- the past and the present. We follow the lives of two strong characters -- Rill Foss (a.k.a. May Crandall) and Avery Stafford. These characters are fictional but are based on true people.

Rill Foss and her brother and sisters are taken from their river boat shanty and placed as wards of the Tennessee Children's Home Society (TCHS) under Miss Georgia Tann, the director. Rill was left with the care of her sibling. One of her sister's, Camillia, has disappea This novel is written in two timelines -- the past and the present. We follow the lives of two strong characters -- Rill Foss (a.k.a. May Crandall) and Avery Stafford. These characters are fictional but are based on true people.

Rill Foss and her brother and sisters are taken from their river boat shanty and placed as wards of the Tennessee Children's Home Society (TCHS) under Miss Georgia Tann, the director. Rill was left with the care of her sibling. One of her sister's, Camillia, has disappeared and the rest, including her brother, are being adopted by affluent families. Unable to stop Miss Tann from adopting out her siblings, Rill sees no other alternative but to try to escape.

Avery Stafford has returned home to help her father, Senator Wells Stafford, through a medical complication. She is also being groomed for his senate seat. It is during a visit to a nursing home for a political photo opportunity that Avery runs into a patient with a mysterious connection to her grandmother. This opens the door to hidden secrets and connections of the past.

The fictional story of Rill and Avery are emotionally moving. I liked the past story -- though heart-wrenching and shocking -- the best. Avery's mystery of digging up the secrets of her Grandma Judy keep the pages turning as well. The horribleness of what Georgia Tann and the Tennessee Children's Home Society did to poor families, single mothers and the children they snatched off of porches and streets causes me to cry for justice. This is a story which must be experienced. I highly recommend this novel.

Below are some quotes which stood out to me.

"What the mind don't remember, the heart still know." --Hootsie

"Secrets ain't a healthy thang. Secrets ain't a healthy thang no matter how old they is. Sometime the oldest secrets is the worst of all." --Hootsie

"Life is not unlike a cinema. Each scene has its own music, and the music is created for the scene, woven to it in ways we do not understand. No matter how much we may love the melody of a bygone day or imagine the song of a future one, we must dance within the music of today, or we will always be out of step, stumbling around in something that doesn't suit the moment." --May Crandall

"A woman's past need not predict her future. She can dance to new music if she chooses." --May Crandall

"But the love of sisters needs no words. It does not depend on memories, or mementos, or proof. It runs as deep as a heartbeat. It is as ever present as a pulse." --May Crandall ...more

56 likes · Like · see review

Jan 12, 2019 Lisa rated it really liked it

I had one cousin who had been adopted and it was something that we always knew. In those days, the prevailing philosophy was to tell children that they'd been adopted from the time they were babies. So I knew he had been flown to New York from an adoption agency in Tennessee. It wasn't until decades later that my family read about the scandals and horrors that had taken place at the Tennessee Children's Home. When I heard about the book through GR, I was interested in reading it.

I have to say th ...more

9 likes · Like · see review

Mar 09, 2018 Judy Lindow rated it liked it

I'd never heard about the woman who created these orphanages and first started commodifying children to the extent she - they - did during this period. Turns out there's a dearth of books on the subject and frankly, I think a non-fiction on the subject would interest me more - the facts in themselves are so bizarre. Truth be told (that's an odd phrase), I don't know much about adopting, but I've heard it's very challenging, they put people through hoops, it costs lots of money, time, there are a ...more

Like · see review

Sep 26, 2019 Donna rated it it was amazing

Shelves: young-adult-lit-fiction, bullying, death, relationships, friendship, n-y-times-best-seller, historical-fiction, realistic-fiction, adult-fiction, disabilities

This book was amazing!! So well written, so heartbreaking, so full of unbreakable love.

1 like · Like · see review

Mar 14, 2020 Melisha rated it it was amazing

Shelves: diversity-in-all-forms

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

Like · see review

Feb 13, 2019 Tippy rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2019, historical-fiction, drama, diversity-in-all-forms-group

I was pretty enthralled with this book from the beginning to end. This is written in the back and forth style, as the author is really telling two stories that ultimately come together. Not all at once but with clues slowly pulling them together like a zipper. It was nicely done.

Trigger warning for folks- this is a very graphic book with depictions of physical and sexual violence of children.

It's also based on a true story >:-( ...more

Like · see review

Nov 06, 2020 Crystal rated it really liked it

There was a lot to enjoy about this book.
The thing I didn’t enjoy about this story was the development of Avery’s character regarding the story line and her relationships with the man (men) she was involved with. I thought it was distracting and unnecessary to move the story along.
That being said I am glad I read it.

Like · see review