Love You More by Jennifer Grant

I am a sucker for memoirs.  I have an adopted son.  So I was quick to snap up the book Love You More:  The Divine Surprise of Adopting My Daughter by Jennifer Grant.

Grant weaves facts and information about adoption, particularly international adoption, with the personal journey of adopting her daughter, Mia, from Guatemala.  The book chronicles the couple's early history as they build their family and how they felt called to pursue adoption.  Details about the adoption process are provided, in the context of their experiences.  The story ends as Mia is settling into life as part of the family, woven in to the place the family has created for her.

I have to admit, that while this book was well written, it wasn't what I was expecting.  The majority of the book was about the adoption process and facts about adoption in general.  I am an adoptive mother, but I couldn't really identify with much.  This probably has more to do with the unusual circumstances of our kinship adoption than the book, but I was still a bit let down to not feel a connection the way I expected.  I also would have enjoyed hearing more about who Mia is and the process of fitting her into the family.  Most of the book covered the process of actually adopting her, not how she adjusted, which was something I was interested in.  I did enjoy and relate to Grant's stories of parenting and lessons learned as she raised babies and toddlers born close together.

While I found this a well-written and interesting book, it was not what I was expecting to read.  I enjoyed it, though, and would definitely pass it on, along with some caveats.

Thunder Dog by Hingson

It has been awhile since I've picked up a book about 9/11.  In fact, the only ones I've read have been novels and I found them to be unrealistic and overly sappy.  This book was a breath of fresh air.  Thunder Dog tells the remarkable true story of a man who cannot see and the dog who guides him out of the burning World Trade Center.

The author has never been one to let his impairment hold him back and so when he found himself in the towers on that September day, hard at work preparing for a meeting, he reacted as he always did.  He simply made a calm decision, trusted his guide dog and was fortunate to make it out of the towers alive.

My favorite part of this book was how the author jumped from the story of his descent down thousands of stairs to the story of his life and how being blind has only been a small part of who he is.  I am a sucker for memoirs and found this one to be candid and interesting.  I am not a dog lover by any means, but I found Roselle, the author's guide dog to be completely endearing. 

Overall, a quick and easy read and an interesting story about one man's survival of 9/11.