Arts & Entertainment

Local Author Shares Personal Story of Sons' Adoption

"Hard to Place" author Marion Goldstein pens a poignant and heartfelt memoir as she recalls the story of her grown sons' adoption and their search for their birth mother.

 

Perhaps it is because Marion Goldstein is a psychologist or because she is an experienced poet that her first book - Hard to Place - is an honest and gripping portrayal of her grown sons' adoption that isn't burdened by undue sentimentality.

Goldstein, who raised her family of five in Bloomfield and Montclair, starts her story as a devoutly Catholic housewife, who, after being devastated by the loss of a baby, embarks on an adoption of two neglected brothers from Canada.

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But the story isn't just about Goldstein's sons - Kurt and Eddie - it's also about Goldstein returning to college, finding a career, and ultimately finding her own place in the world as a mother, wife, psychologist and writer.

"I didn't intend to write a memoir, there were two stories I wanted to tell, the first story was how I came to adopt my two youngest sons . . . who tested retarded, but in the proper environment (turned out to be) perfectly normal. Then 25 years later, when we thought the boys had given up any desire to find their biological family. . . we made the search. I felt I had two stories to tell," Goldstein said recently.

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The book - Hard to Place - gets its title from the adoption category that her sons' fell into - because of their hardship and neglect, they had behavior and learning problems and were deemed difficult to place for adoption.

However, under the Goldstein family's love and attention, the boys flourished and grew up, forging bonds with their siblings, graduating from high school and finding their individual talents. The author is honest about some of the hardships her family went through, scrapes with the law, learning disabilities, and health issues involving her daughter and husband.

"Their bonding with each other helped them overcome the struggles they went through," she said of her children.

But probably the most gripping part of the book is Goldstein's wrenching and brutally honest recounting of her sons looking for their birth mother years later.

"I didn't write someone else's story, I had to put myself into it. I had to put my feelings into it," she said. "It is definitely the emotional truth."

Though the book was originally published in 2009, it has been reprinted recently and has become a local book club favorite. Goldstein, who has retired from her practice of psychotherapy, has spoken at book clubs around the North Jersey area and shares with readers her experiences about writing a book.

Now a grandmother, Goldstein she said she is working on a book of poetry. She said she hopes readers take away two lessons from her story,"The first is to have the reader experience how loss,  though it is impossible to imagine at the time, can be the doorway to fulfillment.
The second is to experience, through the story, the amazing resiliency of Kurt and Eddie and by extension recognize the  potential that exists in every child even when early deprivation predicts otherwise."

 

"Hard to Place" is sold at at independent bookstores, Amazon.com and at Barnes and Noble booksellers.


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