Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love in Retro Chapter Chicks

Jul 31, 2019 Brina rated it really liked it

Shelves: memoirs, jewish-books, genealogy

Infertility. A subject that is taboo in orthodox circles but has become less so in recent years with non-profit groups devoted to helping childless couples have blossomed in recent years. Dani Shapiro was born in 1963 to previously childless couple Paul and Irene Shapiro. Paul had a daughter from a previous marriage but Irene had no children of her own and was approaching forty years old. How they wanted a child, an especially delicate subject in a community where families have four, six, and as Infertility. A subject that is taboo in orthodox circles but has become less so in recent years with non-profit groups devoted to helping childless couples have blossomed in recent years. Dani Shapiro was born in 1963 to previously childless couple Paul and Irene Shapiro. Paul had a daughter from a previous marriage but Irene had no children of her own and was approaching forty years old. How they wanted a child, an especially delicate subject in a community where families have four, six, and as many as twelve or more children. Dani Shapiro is an only child yet questioned her appearance in the mirror. When asked why she only had one child, her mother’s ingenious response is that she hit the jackpot. One day, Shapiro and husband take DNA tests and she finds out that she isn’t who she thinks she is. Inheritance is Shapiro’s moving memoir that chronicles the results of these test results and how they have affected Shapiro’s life for better or worse moving forward.

At age fifty four and a prominent author married to an equally prominent film producer one would think that Dani Shapiro epitomizes the American dream. Her father had died in a car accident thirty years earlier and her mother of complications from the accident five years later. As a child, Dani, named uniquely Daneile by her mother, would be asked if she was Jewish more times than she could remember. Being the only blond haired, blue eyed cousin out of ten first cousins, she starkly contrasted with the rest of the prominent Shapiro clan. She would get remarks like “we could have used a blondie in the camps” and “you really don’t look Jewish.” Her response is that she was fluent in Hebrew and had a full Jewish day school education, accompanying her devoted and devout father to shul every shabbos and holiday. Despite living an orthodox Jewish life as a child, Shapiro let the barbs sting her and questioned her appearance in the mirror because something did not quite add up.

Then the results of the DNA test that altered the core of her existence. Dani Shapiro was not who she thought she was. Her father was not her father or was he. Her half sister who she felt disconnected from was not her sister at all. Inheritance brings up profound questions of nature versus nurture as well as medical and religious ethics. Shapiro was born in the early sixties. Most women were content with being housewives as the baby boom generation had not quite come of age demanding equal rights. Shapiro’s mother wanted nothing more than to be a mother herself and would do anything to get what she wanted, even if it was ethically questionable. In her quest to find out who she really is, Shapiro consults with rabbis, fertility doctors, and family and friends who would have known her parents. As the saying goes, you ask two people, you get three answers, and Shapiro received more answers than questions and continued to soul search. The most moving section occurred when visiting with her nonagenarian aunt, her father’s sister, who proudly proclaimed that she was not ready to give up on Dani if Dani would not give up on her. Perhaps there is something to be said for nurture versus nature after all.

I have always been one to dabble in my family’s genealogy. One year in my teens we held a family reunion for my father’s extended family and met seventh cousins of his who looked like they could be siblings. Dani Shapiro stood out from her family and eventually left an orthodox lifestyle although still celebrating the traditions. She did not feel quite right as the tenth and youngest grandchild of Joseph and Beatrice Shapiro. And at age fifty four she found out why, undergoing a lifelong quest for acceptance in her old and new found families. Shapiro’s mother in an act of denial or love proclaimed that Dani’s son Jacob looks just like her father and his family. Now she knows that that could not be true. Whether or not she will ever feel more comfortable in her old or new families is an ongoing process as Shapiro straddles two worlds. It must have been a gut wrenching process to write this memoir as she had to relive the feelings of finding out who she is. I give Dani Shapiro all the credit in the world. I hope she writes more memoirs on her genealogy and families as this one was profoundly moving and an excellent introduction to her work.

4 stars ...more

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Aug 26, 2019 Celia rated it really liked it

Shelves: group-bom, 2019-read, ten-year-challenge, bios-memoirs, non-fiction, elyse

Dani Shapiro is a well-known memoirist and has written some fiction as well.

This, her memoir Inheritance, chronicles her actions and feelings after she had her DNA tested in 2004. I can only imagine how she felt when she found out her Jewish father was not her genetic father and that his first daughter, her half-sister, was no relation at all.

She was able to track down her genetic father, pseudonymously named Ben Walden, because the site from which she received her DNA info identified a first co ...more

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Aug 05, 2019 Tasha rated it liked it

Shelves: non-fic

3.5
I finished this in basically one day, 24 hours. I found it easy and quick to read. It completely grabbed my interest although I did start to get a little bored by the end. I did lower half a star rating as I felt the several digs to the current politics in the US really unnecessary and self-serving rather than important to the story.

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Aug 27, 2019 Kris (My Novelesque Life) rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: elibrary, nonfiction, audiobook, memoir, retro-chapter

RATING: 2 STARS
(Review Not on Blog)

I am probably in the minority with this one, but I could not get into this memoir. I didn't feel any connection with Dani. I didn't relate, like or feel invested in the outcome of her story. I did finish it, but there was moments I missed of the audiobook, and I did not rewind it. I was really interested in this story when I heard her on a podcast, and the subject matter was really interesting. I had recently seen a 20/20 episode of someone doing a paternity te ...more

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Sep 03, 2019 Sharmon marked it as to-read

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Jun 27, 2019 Stacey B rated it liked it

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Jan 16, 2021 Amber K marked it as to-read

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