I am a reader. I read a lot, especially memoir and nonfiction. And most of the time, I’m comfortable in this vein of works. But there are some times, like this week that I run into a book, or a series of books that I cannot force myself to deal with. Looking back on the choosing of these two memoirs, they didn’t seem all too bleak. But once getting into the meat of the reading, I knew that I couldn’t finish either one. I will give a partial review of them, just in case they might appeal to you. But for me, I realize that I’m too fragile right now to continue with them.
The first book that I’m planning on bailing on, is titled Ten Thousand Sorrows: The Extraordinary Journey of a Korean War Orphan written by Elizabeth Kim.
With my experience with adoption and raising my son, I would like to get as many adoptive experiences from others. It can’t hurt to learn about the things that worked for some and things that didn’t work for others to keep in a mental file for future use if needed. This is the reason I chose Kim’s book from the library shelf. I wanted to learn.
After beginning the book, I knew that I wouldn’t be able to give it a lot of time or energy as her story is not only horrible, I had a hard time believing some of the initial things that she remembered in such great detail at such a young age. And not just random memories here and there, but a catalog of young memories with her birth mother. I can’t say why I felt so suspicious of the author, but even the writing wasn’t sitting well with my either.
The amound of heartache and negative experience that this woman has gone through is hard to read about. There is no respite for the reader in these beginning pages to think that there may be some sort of redemption at the end. I keep thinking to myself the she must have turned out ok, if she wrote a book. Her mistreatment by everyone is sickening. I really don’t think that I can go on with this.
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