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A review by daumari
All You Can Ever Know by Nicole Chung
5.0
This book was very buzzy on my Twitter timeline last year, so I jumped on it when I saw it at the library. All You Can Ever Know is a moving memoir, and I'm thinking about picking up my own copy.
I am not an adoptee. I did grow up in Idaho, however, where I was the only Asian in my grade through elementary school and in middle school, we numbered enough I could count on my hands (a hapa girl, me, a Thai guy, and two Korean adoptees). One of the adoptees was a close friend of mine through high school, and I've always wondered if she was ever curious about her birth family, or ever felt a sense of loss. Our school is a moderate size (~1,000 students), but I recall some microaggressions, mostly from people simply not knowing any Asians but a handful (though honestly I felt stronger discrimination for being non-Mormon). Like child!Nicole, whenever I visit somewhere with an AsAm community like Seattle, I marvel at what it might've been like to see other faces like mine, to potentially have access to language classes etc. though I do have the tether of family we could visit.
It feels personal to me as well because I had an unplanned pregnancy at 21, and my then-BF's parents strongly pressured me to think about adoption as an option- I pictured the nightmare scenario of there only being so many Asian kids in my community and my parents wondering if their grandchild out there, somewhere. In the end, I chose to abort but it really made me realize that I don't think I personally could adopt out, especially if transracial adoptive parents haven't fully figured out how to approach their child's experiences. I know every story is different, but the anguish Nicole felt keeping her feelings to herself in an Oregon town really punched me in the gut.
Weaving in the story of her sister and the joy of building that connection is beautiful. I haven't read many adoption narratives, but this is a good one.
I am not an adoptee. I did grow up in Idaho, however, where I was the only Asian in my grade through elementary school and in middle school, we numbered enough I could count on my hands (a hapa girl, me, a Thai guy, and two Korean adoptees). One of the adoptees was a close friend of mine through high school, and I've always wondered if she was ever curious about her birth family, or ever felt a sense of loss. Our school is a moderate size (~1,000 students), but I recall some microaggressions, mostly from people simply not knowing any Asians but a handful (though honestly I felt stronger discrimination for being non-Mormon). Like child!Nicole, whenever I visit somewhere with an AsAm community like Seattle, I marvel at what it might've been like to see other faces like mine, to potentially have access to language classes etc. though I do have the tether of family we could visit.
It feels personal to me as well because I had an unplanned pregnancy at 21, and my then-BF's parents strongly pressured me to think about adoption as an option- I pictured the nightmare scenario of there only being so many Asian kids in my community and my parents wondering if their grandchild out there, somewhere. In the end, I chose to abort but it really made me realize that I don't think I personally could adopt out, especially if transracial adoptive parents haven't fully figured out how to approach their child's experiences. I know every story is different, but the anguish Nicole felt keeping her feelings to herself in an Oregon town really punched me in the gut.
Weaving in the story of her sister and the joy of building that connection is beautiful. I haven't read many adoption narratives, but this is a good one.