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My Fathers' Daughter
A powerful, intimate memoir of Eritrean-British journalist, Hannah Azieb-Pool, who returns to Eritrea at the age of 30 to meet her family for the first time'What a story. So vivid, honest and moving' Andrea Levy, author of Small Island'When I stepped off the plane in Asmara, I had no idea what lay ahead, or how those events would change me . . .'In her twenties, Hannah-Azieb Pool is given a letter that unravels everything she knows about her life. She knew she was adopted from an orphanage in Eritrea, and as her adoptive family brought her to the UK, they believed she did not have any surviving relatives.When she discovers the truth in a letter from her brother - that her birth father is alive and her Eritrean family are desperate to meet her - she is faced with a critical choice.Should she go?In this intimate memoir, she takes us with her on an extraordinary journey of self-discovery, as she travels to Eritrea to uncover her own story. With radiant warmth, courage and wisdom, Hannah-Azieb disentangles the charged concepts of identity, family and home. Featuring a new introduction from Bernardine Evaristo and an updated afterword from the author, this is a timeless, essential read.'Remarkable' ObserverSelected by Booker Prize-winning author Bernardine Evaristo, this series rediscovers and celebrates pioneering books from black Britain and the diaspora, which remap the nation and reframe our history.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2005
17 people are currently reading
1450 people want to read
About the author
Hannah Azieb Pool
2 books4 followersHannah Azieb Pool is a British–Eritrean writer and journalist. She was born near the town of Keren in Eritrea during the war for independence from Ethiopia. She is a former staff writer for The Guardian newspaper, and writes regularly for national and international media. She is a patron of the SI Leeds Literary Prize for unpublished fiction by Black and Asian women in the UK.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 92 reviews
September 7, 2014
This is an extremely difficult review to write. Not because the book was bad - far from it. No, reviewing it is difficult because the story it tells is so incredibly personal, the writing is so honest and the experiences it relates go right to the core of the author's identity. Any criticism would feel like a belittlement of what the writer is describing and, as such, more than 'just' being a criticism of how she writes, would feel like a comment on who she is. So, deep breath, here goes.
My Fathers' Daughter is the story of Hannah Pool, a successful British journalist who many will recognise from her writing in a national newspaper. Hannah was born in a small village in a remote part of Eritrea but, when her mother died giving birth to her, spent the first few months of her life in an orphanage. She was soon adopted by a white British couple and taken to live in Manchester in the UK (via extended stints in Sudan and Norway), always believing that both her parents were dead. One day, though, she receives a letter from her brother in Eritrea and discovers that her father is, in fact still alive. After a monumental personal struggle she heads off to Eritrea to meet the family she didn't know she had. This book describes those experiences.
As you can imagine, this all makes for a pretty intense read. However, Hannah Pool's writing style manages to make the book very accessible and there are touches of real humour throughout ("All I feel is numb. I have felt more emotionally involved watching Eastenders"; "Suddenly I am gripped by a Daily Mail-like panic"), which serve to lighten the mood. She successfully explores all kinds of issues which people who have not had her experiences (for example, me) may not even have thought of as "issues." From growing up dark skinned with white parents and siblings; to deciding what significance wearing her hair in an Afro would have at home or in Eritrea; to feeling jealous of her sister (who grew up in poverty) for not having been given away and struggling with the guilt that that thought brings, knowing that she is the "fortunate" one; to seeing the bed where her mother died in childbirth and addressing the knowledge that she effectively killed her; to trying to manage the sense of betrayal towards her adoptive father that visiting her biological family brings, the questions are addressed openly, honestly and movingly throughout. Nothing is too uncomfortable for her to examine and at the end of the book I was left with an overwhelming admiration for the huge strength of character she shows in laying all this out in the open for anyone to read.
And now for the difficult bit. I am not going to give five stars. I'd like to give 4.5 but am not able to. So it's a 4. This is nothing to do with the content of the story, which is gripping. It also has nothing to do with the way the author expresses herself, which is lucid, clean and entertaining or with the emotional content involved (I really struggled to look nonchalant when reading on the bus). The only reason I am knocking it down (albeit not much) is because I felt that towards the middle of the book the pace suffered slightly through a little too much introspection. And that is why it's a hard review to write. The self-examination is essential to the book and is one of its great strengths. However I did feel that a short section when Hannah is in a hotel in Asmara, waiting to meet her family, could have been shortened slightly just to keep the "story" moving. That is the only thing I would change in this book.
Hannah Pool has written an eye-opening, fascinating and intensely honest and moving account of meeting her birth family for the first time. I admire her courage enormously: for undertaking the visit to Eritrea; for facing her demons head on, and for writing it all down and inviting everyone else in to experience her most personal thoughts and feelings with her. I challenge anyone to read this book and remain unmoved. Hats off. Big time.
My Fathers' Daughter is the story of Hannah Pool, a successful British journalist who many will recognise from her writing in a national newspaper. Hannah was born in a small village in a remote part of Eritrea but, when her mother died giving birth to her, spent the first few months of her life in an orphanage. She was soon adopted by a white British couple and taken to live in Manchester in the UK (via extended stints in Sudan and Norway), always believing that both her parents were dead. One day, though, she receives a letter from her brother in Eritrea and discovers that her father is, in fact still alive. After a monumental personal struggle she heads off to Eritrea to meet the family she didn't know she had. This book describes those experiences.
As you can imagine, this all makes for a pretty intense read. However, Hannah Pool's writing style manages to make the book very accessible and there are touches of real humour throughout ("All I feel is numb. I have felt more emotionally involved watching Eastenders"; "Suddenly I am gripped by a Daily Mail-like panic"), which serve to lighten the mood. She successfully explores all kinds of issues which people who have not had her experiences (for example, me) may not even have thought of as "issues." From growing up dark skinned with white parents and siblings; to deciding what significance wearing her hair in an Afro would have at home or in Eritrea; to feeling jealous of her sister (who grew up in poverty) for not having been given away and struggling with the guilt that that thought brings, knowing that she is the "fortunate" one; to seeing the bed where her mother died in childbirth and addressing the knowledge that she effectively killed her; to trying to manage the sense of betrayal towards her adoptive father that visiting her biological family brings, the questions are addressed openly, honestly and movingly throughout. Nothing is too uncomfortable for her to examine and at the end of the book I was left with an overwhelming admiration for the huge strength of character she shows in laying all this out in the open for anyone to read.
And now for the difficult bit. I am not going to give five stars. I'd like to give 4.5 but am not able to. So it's a 4. This is nothing to do with the content of the story, which is gripping. It also has nothing to do with the way the author expresses herself, which is lucid, clean and entertaining or with the emotional content involved (I really struggled to look nonchalant when reading on the bus). The only reason I am knocking it down (albeit not much) is because I felt that towards the middle of the book the pace suffered slightly through a little too much introspection. And that is why it's a hard review to write. The self-examination is essential to the book and is one of its great strengths. However I did feel that a short section when Hannah is in a hotel in Asmara, waiting to meet her family, could have been shortened slightly just to keep the "story" moving. That is the only thing I would change in this book.
Hannah Pool has written an eye-opening, fascinating and intensely honest and moving account of meeting her birth family for the first time. I admire her courage enormously: for undertaking the visit to Eritrea; for facing her demons head on, and for writing it all down and inviting everyone else in to experience her most personal thoughts and feelings with her. I challenge anyone to read this book and remain unmoved. Hats off. Big time.
August 14, 2022
An excellent portrayal of a young woman's discovery of her family and the return to meet them, to encounter her cultural origins for the first time.
She writes with an honesty about her feelings and sometimes lack of, and the often latent emotional response that comes later. These encounters often put her in the "freeze" state, making her seem disassociated from the significant encounters, a common reaction by an adoptee, a survival mechanism that's been hardwired into their nervous system from the initial separation.
It's a story of uncovering the truth, of making connections, a kind of healing or reconciliation. Much to ponder.
Ultimately what has been lost can never be found. It's like she was able to view a kind of movie of who she might have been and the life she may have had, and while viewing it was catharthic, it is indeed an illusion, a life imagined, never possible to live.
Is she better for knowing? Absolutely.
She writes with an honesty about her feelings and sometimes lack of, and the often latent emotional response that comes later. These encounters often put her in the "freeze" state, making her seem disassociated from the significant encounters, a common reaction by an adoptee, a survival mechanism that's been hardwired into their nervous system from the initial separation.
It's a story of uncovering the truth, of making connections, a kind of healing or reconciliation. Much to ponder.
Ultimately what has been lost can never be found. It's like she was able to view a kind of movie of who she might have been and the life she may have had, and while viewing it was catharthic, it is indeed an illusion, a life imagined, never possible to live.
Is she better for knowing? Absolutely.
May 15, 2016
This is a very readable and engaging memoir, about a British journalist’s trip to Eritrea to meet her birth family. As a baby, Hannah Pool was adopted from an orphanage by a white couple then working in Sudan. She grew up primarily in England, and had no contact with her birth family until age 29, when she finally followed up on a letter a brother had sent her a decade before. Meeting a cousin in London ultimately led to her taking a two-week trip to Eritrea, where she met her biological father, several siblings and extended family. Initially she arranged to meet the family in the capital, Asmara, but she wound up traveling to her father’s and sister’s remote villages to see their real lives and the place where she was born.
The book is more an emotional memoir than a travelogue: whether because the author is an especially sensitive person or because of the emotional nature of her trip (probably a combination of the two), she has a lot of feelings about everything and describes them in detail. This basically works: the subject matter is interesting, and her writing is clear and engaging and makes for quick reading. And we do get the chance to learn about Eritrea along with the author. Ultimately, though, it’s a deeply personal story, as the author struggles with her own identity, with becoming part of a “new” family without betraying her adoptive father and siblings, with trying to connect to family members with whom she has no common language, and with her feelings about having been put up for adoption.
Despite all that, this memoir still feels fairly lightweight. It is, after all, an entire book about a two-week visit. And it was published a mere two years after the trip, an astonishingly quick turnaround, especially if we assume close to a year for the editing and publishing process before the book hit the shelves. It’s evident that the author was still processing events at the time she wrote it, and she seems to struggle particularly with describing the effects of the trip on her life. No doubt this was a life-changing experience, but at the time of this writing she hadn’t yet had the chance to see her Eritrean family again, and instead writes about, for instance, seeking out Eritrean restaurants. What I really want to read is the book she writes 20 or 30 years after the trip, about how both her biological and adoptive families fit into her life.
That said, I’m glad the author still wrote this book; it provided a few pleasant evenings’ reading for me, and would likely offer a much deeper connection for those who share some of the author’s experiences. Certainly worth seeking out for those interested in Eritrea or international adoption.
The book is more an emotional memoir than a travelogue: whether because the author is an especially sensitive person or because of the emotional nature of her trip (probably a combination of the two), she has a lot of feelings about everything and describes them in detail. This basically works: the subject matter is interesting, and her writing is clear and engaging and makes for quick reading. And we do get the chance to learn about Eritrea along with the author. Ultimately, though, it’s a deeply personal story, as the author struggles with her own identity, with becoming part of a “new” family without betraying her adoptive father and siblings, with trying to connect to family members with whom she has no common language, and with her feelings about having been put up for adoption.
Despite all that, this memoir still feels fairly lightweight. It is, after all, an entire book about a two-week visit. And it was published a mere two years after the trip, an astonishingly quick turnaround, especially if we assume close to a year for the editing and publishing process before the book hit the shelves. It’s evident that the author was still processing events at the time she wrote it, and she seems to struggle particularly with describing the effects of the trip on her life. No doubt this was a life-changing experience, but at the time of this writing she hadn’t yet had the chance to see her Eritrean family again, and instead writes about, for instance, seeking out Eritrean restaurants. What I really want to read is the book she writes 20 or 30 years after the trip, about how both her biological and adoptive families fit into her life.
That said, I’m glad the author still wrote this book; it provided a few pleasant evenings’ reading for me, and would likely offer a much deeper connection for those who share some of the author’s experiences. Certainly worth seeking out for those interested in Eritrea or international adoption.
March 9, 2024
This book is a very special book to me. I picked it for my literary journey to Eritrea, but I also picked it because it is a memoir by an Eritrean adoptee on her first homeland visit to her birth country. The world wide diaspora of peoples from the Horn of Africa is personal to me. My children are part of that diaspora - two by birth with an Ethiopian father, and 4 adopted as young children from Ethiopia. My two youngest have a Tigrinyan mother and Eritrean father. The other two are Amhara, from Addis Ababa. I’ve taken my children back to Ethiopia to reconnect with surviving birth family and, while every experience is unique, this book captures the complexity of the Ethiopian/Eritrean adoption-related diaspora. It is so complicated. These homeland trips are amazing, devastating, surreal - so many adjectives to pick from - and always life changing.
Thank you to Hannah Pool for sharing her incredibly personal journey. If you are touched in some way by this diaspora, this is a book where you can feel part of a larger experience. So many times I paused and wept as a memory crept back in.
Thank you to Hannah Pool for sharing her incredibly personal journey. If you are touched in some way by this diaspora, this is a book where you can feel part of a larger experience. So many times I paused and wept as a memory crept back in.
June 8, 2011
I have read stories about adoptees meeting their birth families, and I have watched the shows on television about the same thing. Never though did I ever imagine what it might be like for someone who was adopted from a third world country to returne to the strange land of their birth.
The author is very honest, and open about her experience. I feel that this womans story is very unique in that we get to read about an African village from a whole different point of view. She is not an aid worker who will make the country seem hot, smelly, and strange. She is not a runaway bride that is now telling her story after becoming a famous model, making the country sound like paradise gone wrong. Hannah Pool gets to be the outsider not just looking in but being embraced into the intimate lives of African villagers.
The author is very honest, and open about her experience. I feel that this womans story is very unique in that we get to read about an African village from a whole different point of view. She is not an aid worker who will make the country seem hot, smelly, and strange. She is not a runaway bride that is now telling her story after becoming a famous model, making the country sound like paradise gone wrong. Hannah Pool gets to be the outsider not just looking in but being embraced into the intimate lives of African villagers.
June 20, 2022
My dad was adopted so I have a soft spot for memoirs about adoption. Whilst my Dad was spared some of the hurt by learning of his adoption in his 40’s, there were some niggling worries that something was not right. For example, his sister’s birthday being changed when she got her first ID.
There was no escaping the adoption status in this memoir. Hannah was born in Eritrea and adopted to white English parents. Despite her adoption certificate describing her status as orphaned, she later received correspondence from a relative suggesting otherwise. Battling with the dilemmas of tracing her biological heritage she keeps putting it off and off. She loves her dad and doesn’t want to hurt him by tracing her other family.
Hannah takes the plunge and returns to Eritrea to meet her relatives. I won’t spoil the story but once she gets there, you won’t be able to put the book down. She is so honest and you can just feel her anguish. Growing up in London then meeting people from a completely different culture is not easy. There’s the language, traditions, gender role expectations, and the unknown. And then there’s the expectations of everyone else. Some people were in tears at meeting her after all these before even giving a proper introduction.
There are some blood-boiling parts: resentments, injustices, sheer outrages, and misgivings. I want to say more on this but won’t.
What I was most pleased with was the combination of honesty and tension. Some autobiographies I’ve read have left out the best bits (the controversies etc) but not here, she had unanswered questions. The tension was high because she had so much to lose, and could easily have let things slide.
Even though I have a good understanding with my Dad about his adoption, it still provides valuable insight into the inner workings involved. I guess there are well-intending people out there but having to answer questions about people’s adoption would be grating.
Aside from that, I read this as part of my around the world challenge. I learned a lot about Eritrea, especially about traditions and beliefs.
There was no escaping the adoption status in this memoir. Hannah was born in Eritrea and adopted to white English parents. Despite her adoption certificate describing her status as orphaned, she later received correspondence from a relative suggesting otherwise. Battling with the dilemmas of tracing her biological heritage she keeps putting it off and off. She loves her dad and doesn’t want to hurt him by tracing her other family.
Hannah takes the plunge and returns to Eritrea to meet her relatives. I won’t spoil the story but once she gets there, you won’t be able to put the book down. She is so honest and you can just feel her anguish. Growing up in London then meeting people from a completely different culture is not easy. There’s the language, traditions, gender role expectations, and the unknown. And then there’s the expectations of everyone else. Some people were in tears at meeting her after all these before even giving a proper introduction.
There are some blood-boiling parts: resentments, injustices, sheer outrages, and misgivings. I want to say more on this but won’t.
What I was most pleased with was the combination of honesty and tension. Some autobiographies I’ve read have left out the best bits (the controversies etc) but not here, she had unanswered questions. The tension was high because she had so much to lose, and could easily have let things slide.
Even though I have a good understanding with my Dad about his adoption, it still provides valuable insight into the inner workings involved. I guess there are well-intending people out there but having to answer questions about people’s adoption would be grating.
Aside from that, I read this as part of my around the world challenge. I learned a lot about Eritrea, especially about traditions and beliefs.
October 18, 2016
I throughly enjoyed this book. While I am not an Eritrean, I lived in Asmara for most of my elementary school years. There used to be a US Military base in Asmara called Kagnew Station. I remember my time in Eritrea fondly. It was Ethiopia when I lived there. The revolution was just beginning when we left. I left Asmara the year that Hannah was born, 1974. I was 12 years old. I have been to most of the larger cities she mentioned in the book. The towns of Keren and Massawa had recreation areas for U.S. Military soldiers and sailors and their families. I spent many happy hours swimming in the Red Sea in Massawa as a child. I too can spot an Eritrean anywhere I go. Most of my friends from those days can too. They are some of the most beautiful people on the entire continent of Africa in my opinion. Even though I am a white American I had a special feeling when I lived there. A feeling I have never experienced anywhere else I have ever lived. It's like a feeling of being grounded to the Earth. It's standing in one of the most ancient places in the world and really feeling it. I would love to go back some day. I'm sure that most of the Eritreans I knew back then are probably no longer alive. I know the revolution and continuing war with Ethiopia were and are brutal. I really enjoyed this book and thank Hannah for writing it. I thought it was excellent! I would love to have some Zigni and Injera for dinner again! I need to find an Ethiopian restaurant in South Florida! I pray some day they will be blessed with peace again. Sorry for the randomness of this review. I'm just overwhelmed with good memories!
December 23, 2022
Read around the world project - Eritrea
This is an honest and emotional memoir from Hannah Pool, a British Eritrean journalist who was adopted by a white couple as an infant. At twenty-nine, after a decade of debating if she should or should not, Pool decided to go back to Eritrea to trace her birth family. This memoir covers her two week trip back to her birthplace.
More than a description of what happened and who she met, this is a memoir of how Pool felt - she recounts every thought and worry she had about her identity, her relationship with her adopted family, her fears, her privilege, and her new family. This emotional aspect of the memoir gives it both an openness and authenticity, but also weighs it down (for example, we spend tens of pages in her hotel room before the initial meet/greet).
3.5/5 stars
Overall I thought this gave me a great glimpse into both Eritrean culture and life, as well as what it means to be adopted. I'm glad I read it!
This is an honest and emotional memoir from Hannah Pool, a British Eritrean journalist who was adopted by a white couple as an infant. At twenty-nine, after a decade of debating if she should or should not, Pool decided to go back to Eritrea to trace her birth family. This memoir covers her two week trip back to her birthplace.
More than a description of what happened and who she met, this is a memoir of how Pool felt - she recounts every thought and worry she had about her identity, her relationship with her adopted family, her fears, her privilege, and her new family. This emotional aspect of the memoir gives it both an openness and authenticity, but also weighs it down (for example, we spend tens of pages in her hotel room before the initial meet/greet).
3.5/5 stars
Overall I thought this gave me a great glimpse into both Eritrean culture and life, as well as what it means to be adopted. I'm glad I read it!
July 6, 2017
Return to Eritrea.
Around the time I visited Eritrea I read two books - one about an Eritrean refugee making the treacherous journey out of Eritrea and the other about Hannah Pool, a British journalist who was born in a remote village in Eritrea and adopted from an orphanage, leaving a family she had never met. They complimented each other and both, in their own ways, educated me on this country that I knew so little about.
Hannah's mother had died giving birth to her, and her father, who already had a large family, put her into an orphanage for care. The couple who adopted her were told that her parents were dead and she was adopted into Norway and then UK, as the coloured daughter of white parents. For many years she had no idea that she had any family other than her adopted one, until, at the age of 19 she received a letter from her brother, informing her that her father was still alive. She was dumb-struck, all these years she had believed that she had no living relatives and here were a brother and father in one.
However, she didn't want to hurt her adoptive father and wasn't sure of her own feelings, so it was another 10 years until she followed up on the letter. It turned out that she had a cousin visiting London and so her first move was to meet up with him. From him she learned that she had many sisters and brothers and that her father was still living.
At the age of 29 she finally found the courage to make the journey to the land of her birth and meet her large family.
The trip involved a number if issues, primarily the fact that she could only communicate directly with family members who spoke English; she had only a few words in her native tongue. She also found it very strange to find that after being so obviously black amongst so many whites in her adopted country, she now melded with the huge crowd of Eritreans when she arrived at the airport - only to discover that there were things about her that they could detect and thus label her as an 'incomer', and put her into another sub-set of the population.
Her original plan to meet with her family in the capital, Asmara, developed into a wish to see them in their home villages and see the home where she was born. This journey into the hinterlands was my favourite part of the book, a fascinating travelogue. What she found there was eye-opening and made her think again about her wish that she had been allowed to stay with her birth family.
This was a fascinating story, told with raw emotion. My only issue with it was that Hannah spent a bit too long on some of the emotional issues - shall I leave this room, no, I'll just stay here, but I must go......(not a literal quote), until the repetition became irritating. Otherwise, an excellent view into adoption into a different coloured family and the reunion with family that she had long believed dead.
Also read:
Paradise Denied by Zekarias Kebraeb (5stars)
Around the time I visited Eritrea I read two books - one about an Eritrean refugee making the treacherous journey out of Eritrea and the other about Hannah Pool, a British journalist who was born in a remote village in Eritrea and adopted from an orphanage, leaving a family she had never met. They complimented each other and both, in their own ways, educated me on this country that I knew so little about.
Hannah's mother had died giving birth to her, and her father, who already had a large family, put her into an orphanage for care. The couple who adopted her were told that her parents were dead and she was adopted into Norway and then UK, as the coloured daughter of white parents. For many years she had no idea that she had any family other than her adopted one, until, at the age of 19 she received a letter from her brother, informing her that her father was still alive. She was dumb-struck, all these years she had believed that she had no living relatives and here were a brother and father in one.
However, she didn't want to hurt her adoptive father and wasn't sure of her own feelings, so it was another 10 years until she followed up on the letter. It turned out that she had a cousin visiting London and so her first move was to meet up with him. From him she learned that she had many sisters and brothers and that her father was still living.
At the age of 29 she finally found the courage to make the journey to the land of her birth and meet her large family.
The trip involved a number if issues, primarily the fact that she could only communicate directly with family members who spoke English; she had only a few words in her native tongue. She also found it very strange to find that after being so obviously black amongst so many whites in her adopted country, she now melded with the huge crowd of Eritreans when she arrived at the airport - only to discover that there were things about her that they could detect and thus label her as an 'incomer', and put her into another sub-set of the population.
Her original plan to meet with her family in the capital, Asmara, developed into a wish to see them in their home villages and see the home where she was born. This journey into the hinterlands was my favourite part of the book, a fascinating travelogue. What she found there was eye-opening and made her think again about her wish that she had been allowed to stay with her birth family.
This was a fascinating story, told with raw emotion. My only issue with it was that Hannah spent a bit too long on some of the emotional issues - shall I leave this room, no, I'll just stay here, but I must go......(not a literal quote), until the repetition became irritating. Otherwise, an excellent view into adoption into a different coloured family and the reunion with family that she had long believed dead.
Also read:
Paradise Denied by Zekarias Kebraeb (5stars)
May 8, 2009
The author was adopted by a white British couple, at the age of six months from an orphanage in Eritrea. During her early years she lives through a lot of displacement, but finally settles in with her adoptive father and stepmother in England. Her adoptive parents had been told she was an orphan, so when she receives a letter from a cousin announcing that her birth father is living, and that she has a number of siblings and half-siblings in Eritrea, and cousins around the world, her world is turned upside down. But she ignores the letter for nine years before deciding to meet her Eritrean family. Her decision to do so, and the story of the trip itself make up the bulk of the book.
The situation is a fascinating one, as Pool deals with issues of class and color and identity. What is not fascinating is her breathless recounting of every little thought and panicked moment, leaving the reader to think Pool is immature for her of her age. An interesting book that could have used a bit more editing.
The situation is a fascinating one, as Pool deals with issues of class and color and identity. What is not fascinating is her breathless recounting of every little thought and panicked moment, leaving the reader to think Pool is immature for her of her age. An interesting book that could have used a bit more editing.
February 5, 2008
This book is about a woman who visits her country of birth, Eritrea, about 30 years after she was adopted by English parents. I learned a lot about what international adoptees might feel and the emotions that surface as they investigate their past and meet biological family members. It was especially interesting that she consistently affirms that she wishes she had never been adopted despite what that might have meant (being a child soldier, dying young, poverty, etc.)....
My only criticism of this book is that it was 25% plot and 75% feelings and thoughts by the author. For example, about a dozen times, she talks about how she feels like tracing her birth family was a huge betrayal of her adoptive dad. There are just tons of pages filled with her thoughts and feelings- and it's quite repetitive.
My only criticism of this book is that it was 25% plot and 75% feelings and thoughts by the author. For example, about a dozen times, she talks about how she feels like tracing her birth family was a huge betrayal of her adoptive dad. There are just tons of pages filled with her thoughts and feelings- and it's quite repetitive.
February 23, 2024
Hannah Azieb Pool was adopted at six months old by a British-American couple who were led to believe she was an orphan. However, a letter Hannah receives from one of her cousins informing her that this is not the case and her birth father is still alive turns her world upside down. It takes the author almost another decade to get in touch with said cousin and begin to confront her personal history.
I liked the fact that Pool allows you into other labyrinths on an adoptee's mind and see first hand all their insecurities and I truly enjoyed the journalistic descriptions of both the urban buzz off Asmara and Pool's journey to the villages where her roots were laid.
However, I found the self introspection at times with up to ten pages at times dedicated to each panic-stricken moment overwhelming the narrative and detracting from the broader story. At times, her emotional knee-jerk reactions to cultural expectations and her views on her adoption through the blinkered Western perspective made her come across like a petulant child which can't be far from the truth. Perhaps these issues could have been avoided with tighter editing.
I liked the fact that Pool allows you into other labyrinths on an adoptee's mind and see first hand all their insecurities and I truly enjoyed the journalistic descriptions of both the urban buzz off Asmara and Pool's journey to the villages where her roots were laid.
However, I found the self introspection at times with up to ten pages at times dedicated to each panic-stricken moment overwhelming the narrative and detracting from the broader story. At times, her emotional knee-jerk reactions to cultural expectations and her views on her adoption through the blinkered Western perspective made her come across like a petulant child which can't be far from the truth. Perhaps these issues could have been avoided with tighter editing.
April 14, 2019
Ι would put 3 stars for the literature part of this book. The language didn't really impress me.
But, the story is powerful and interesting. A very personal story that becomes important especially as a window for white western people to lives and experiences with different challenges then we know. I feel very grateful the author decided to write her story. One of these books who broaden horizons 100%. Not only learning about a little country we don't talk much but also about heritage, adoption, belonging, family and identity.
But, the story is powerful and interesting. A very personal story that becomes important especially as a window for white western people to lives and experiences with different challenges then we know. I feel very grateful the author decided to write her story. One of these books who broaden horizons 100%. Not only learning about a little country we don't talk much but also about heritage, adoption, belonging, family and identity.
July 5, 2020
The tracing dilemma goes to the heart of what it means to be adopted. Questions of blood and identity of what makes someone family and what it means to be a parent, or a child, all come to a head when tracing is brought into an already heady mix. If my birth father is still alive, whose child am I?
August 13, 2022
Beautifully written book. Hannah takes you through all the emotions of her journey back to Eritrea. Sometimes it’s so hard to write well about an event that happened in really life but she does this so incredibly it feels like I was with her meeting her family. Will never forget this book.
September 3, 2024
Oppvokst i Norge? Tar en sosiologi utdanning? My kinda woman. Veldig fin bok, nydelig skrevet og gøy å lese om reisen hennes. Kjenner meg hvertfall igjen i det å besøke «hjemlandet» uten å kunne språket. Bittersweet å være ferdig med boken.
April 17, 2023
Just a note, was refreshing to see a content warning at the start of this audiobook. It is in fact possible to see that this is a tremendous work in regard to an adoptee reuniting with her bio family from her country of birth while also acknowledging she went in with stereotypical views/fears of said country.
June 20, 2024
Liked it-very vivid and eye opening, about a young woman visiting her family in Eritrea (🇪🇷 )
July 2, 2024
Really enjoyed this memoir and Pools writing style and her ability to add wit and humour into maybe some of her most serious emotional memories of her life a very enjoyable yet emotional read
December 17, 2019
I read this book as part of my quest to read a book written by an author from every country in the world. The author of this book is from Eritrea.
I thought this was a beautiful book and I learned a great deal about Eritrea. Eritrea is located on the eastern coast of Africa, just above Ethiopia. It is located on the Red Sea, across from Saudia Arabia. Its seaports have been important for centuries.
Eritrea has been owned and occupied by many countries, including Italy and Britain. It was once part of Ethiopia, but it fought to gain its independence in 1991. The country requires military service and many people move out of the country to escape it. Many people are very poor and the country has some of the worst human rights abuses in the world.
Hannah was born in Asmara and her mom died in childbirth. She was adopted by an English couple and grew up in England. She is contacted by distant cousins and decides that she would like to trace her roots. With much trepidation and fear, Hannah travels to Asmara to meet her birth family. The love of her immediate and extended family is amazing.
While walking in Asmara, Hannah makes an observation that I have never thought of. On pg. 63, Hannah thinks, "There's another big difference that it takes me a while to pin down. It's not about what people are wearing or the language they are speaking, but it's no less obvious. It's the way everyone is walking, or rather carrying themselves. At first, I think it is the fact that everyone seems to be strolling. It must be too hot to rush, I reckon. But it's more than that. It's even those not walking, just standing around, chatting in groups, waiting at bus stops...... Everyone looks so comfortable, so relaxed, walking around as if they own the place. So this is what black people look like when they are not having to constantly look over their shoulder, or justify their presence. When they are not always waiting for the next bit of aggression, expecting to be singled out, ignored, or given too much attention depending on the situation."
A few pages later, Hannah is talking to her friend that is guiding her through Asmara:
"I tentatively tell Teame how I think people walk taller here, or am I just falling into the Western anthropologist's trap of making stupid assumptions about "proud Africans"? To my relief, he smiles and then laughs and says, "When you go from Africa to the U.S. or Europe on a scholarship you get treated differently, badly, but it doesn't matter because you always have Africa, you can always come back. You will be different now that you know you can always come here. If they treat you badly back at home, if someone is racist to you, it won't matter so much because now you know what it feels like to belong somewhere."
Of course, being a white American, I have never thought that the way Africans act and carry themselves, might actually look different when they are in their own countries - because they are home and feel safe. It is such an obvious observation that I have never thought about.
I thought this was a beautiful book and I learned a great deal about Eritrea. Eritrea is located on the eastern coast of Africa, just above Ethiopia. It is located on the Red Sea, across from Saudia Arabia. Its seaports have been important for centuries.
Eritrea has been owned and occupied by many countries, including Italy and Britain. It was once part of Ethiopia, but it fought to gain its independence in 1991. The country requires military service and many people move out of the country to escape it. Many people are very poor and the country has some of the worst human rights abuses in the world.
Hannah was born in Asmara and her mom died in childbirth. She was adopted by an English couple and grew up in England. She is contacted by distant cousins and decides that she would like to trace her roots. With much trepidation and fear, Hannah travels to Asmara to meet her birth family. The love of her immediate and extended family is amazing.
While walking in Asmara, Hannah makes an observation that I have never thought of. On pg. 63, Hannah thinks, "There's another big difference that it takes me a while to pin down. It's not about what people are wearing or the language they are speaking, but it's no less obvious. It's the way everyone is walking, or rather carrying themselves. At first, I think it is the fact that everyone seems to be strolling. It must be too hot to rush, I reckon. But it's more than that. It's even those not walking, just standing around, chatting in groups, waiting at bus stops...... Everyone looks so comfortable, so relaxed, walking around as if they own the place. So this is what black people look like when they are not having to constantly look over their shoulder, or justify their presence. When they are not always waiting for the next bit of aggression, expecting to be singled out, ignored, or given too much attention depending on the situation."
A few pages later, Hannah is talking to her friend that is guiding her through Asmara:
"I tentatively tell Teame how I think people walk taller here, or am I just falling into the Western anthropologist's trap of making stupid assumptions about "proud Africans"? To my relief, he smiles and then laughs and says, "When you go from Africa to the U.S. or Europe on a scholarship you get treated differently, badly, but it doesn't matter because you always have Africa, you can always come back. You will be different now that you know you can always come here. If they treat you badly back at home, if someone is racist to you, it won't matter so much because now you know what it feels like to belong somewhere."
Of course, being a white American, I have never thought that the way Africans act and carry themselves, might actually look different when they are in their own countries - because they are home and feel safe. It is such an obvious observation that I have never thought about.
December 20, 2012
My Fathers' Daughter by Hannah Pool was a well thought out memoir. She took us on a journey through her experience of adoption and retracing her roots. The true details of what it was like to be face to face with the family that gave her up nearly 30 years ago.
This book deserves 4 stars because I felt like I was in Hannah's shoes and a part of her journey back home. She shared what it was like to live in a household where no one looked like her in a very respectable manner. I enjoyed reading her memoir in a more humors way. She was able to bring light to her situation and not feel as though she would never be able to find her true identity.
"Imagine what it's like to never have seen another woman or man from your own family. To spend your life looking for clues in the faces of strangers...We all need to know why we were given up," (Hannah Pool). Although she came to realize that it was actually in her interest to be adopted, given the financial circumstances her biological family endured, she still needed answers as to why it was her and not her other siblings. Who she belonged to, where she came from, and her blood relatives, questions which she had been receiving all her life, but didn't have the answers to.
In class we just got done with writing children’s stories. One of the difficult topics to explain to children was adoption. Children who are given up for adoption live their lives wondering why they were separated from their family. They want to know if it was their fault or if they could have done something differently in order to prevent the adoption.
This book is great for teenagers who want to know more about others around them and how someone's life can change if they are given up for adoption. Or what it's like to live in a household with people you don't look like, while knowing you have family across the country and you don't even know their names or what they look like.
This book deserves 4 stars because I felt like I was in Hannah's shoes and a part of her journey back home. She shared what it was like to live in a household where no one looked like her in a very respectable manner. I enjoyed reading her memoir in a more humors way. She was able to bring light to her situation and not feel as though she would never be able to find her true identity.
"Imagine what it's like to never have seen another woman or man from your own family. To spend your life looking for clues in the faces of strangers...We all need to know why we were given up," (Hannah Pool). Although she came to realize that it was actually in her interest to be adopted, given the financial circumstances her biological family endured, she still needed answers as to why it was her and not her other siblings. Who she belonged to, where she came from, and her blood relatives, questions which she had been receiving all her life, but didn't have the answers to.
In class we just got done with writing children’s stories. One of the difficult topics to explain to children was adoption. Children who are given up for adoption live their lives wondering why they were separated from their family. They want to know if it was their fault or if they could have done something differently in order to prevent the adoption.
This book is great for teenagers who want to know more about others around them and how someone's life can change if they are given up for adoption. Or what it's like to live in a household with people you don't look like, while knowing you have family across the country and you don't even know their names or what they look like.
February 14, 2009
An amazing first-person account of a life not lived and another path to reliving it. It is one of the best memoirs I have read. In most part I think it is because she tells the story through her own eyes and not those of others or even herself in an awkward formation of description and detail. I can't tell you much about this story but I think that it applies to many of us in some form or other. She lives one life while thinking of another and has the chance to actually live it. While living it she learns more about herself and the life she has lead and will lead in the future; not a gift many of us get.
All I can say is that I hope you read this book with eyes wide-open and look at your life through the vision this memoir gives you. This author gives us something not many memoir writers can, a view into our own lives through hers and the lives she has and could have lead. Perhaps you need ot be a certain age to read this but i think if you are open enough Pool can get you to think about life and those lives around you without much effort simply because she told the story in first-person; not your typical memoir of today but one that allows you to live in her skin and experience all she has to offer. Without the ending I can't tell you much but she was adopted from Africa, lived in Britain and then went back to where she was adopted from and returns to think about all her lives, actually lived and those that could have been and the one she now lives because of the mixture of the two. Give it a try, but be open to applying it to your own life. This is a book I think that was overlooked by previous reviewers, hopefully one day it will gain the acclaim and mass awareness that it deserves.
All I can say is that I hope you read this book with eyes wide-open and look at your life through the vision this memoir gives you. This author gives us something not many memoir writers can, a view into our own lives through hers and the lives she has and could have lead. Perhaps you need ot be a certain age to read this but i think if you are open enough Pool can get you to think about life and those lives around you without much effort simply because she told the story in first-person; not your typical memoir of today but one that allows you to live in her skin and experience all she has to offer. Without the ending I can't tell you much but she was adopted from Africa, lived in Britain and then went back to where she was adopted from and returns to think about all her lives, actually lived and those that could have been and the one she now lives because of the mixture of the two. Give it a try, but be open to applying it to your own life. This is a book I think that was overlooked by previous reviewers, hopefully one day it will gain the acclaim and mass awareness that it deserves.
September 4, 2015
This is s wonderful book about a woman who was adopted from Eritrea, grows up in England and believed that she was an orphan with no family. What I liked so much about the book was her honesty. She described in detail how she felt about being adopted, then finding out that she had a family that wanted to meet her. The anxiety of meeting her real father, and the emotions she experienced, traveling to Eritrea to meet her him for the first time.
Hannah Pool describes the villages where most of her family lives as well as the capital, Asmara. She wrote this book in such a way that you feel you are right there beside her through all of it. I highly recommend it.
Hannah Pool describes the villages where most of her family lives as well as the capital, Asmara. She wrote this book in such a way that you feel you are right there beside her through all of it. I highly recommend it.
September 4, 2014
Hannah Pool was born in Eritrea and adopted as a baby. The book is about her journey to the land of her birth to meet her family and find out about the life she might have led.
I think she is a little too starry-eyed about the traditional way of life, her adoption gave her many advantages she would not have had as a girl in that society. It is an interesting and at times moving story and I could understand her need to identify with the culture and traditions she felt she had lost.
I think she is a little too starry-eyed about the traditional way of life, her adoption gave her many advantages she would not have had as a girl in that society. It is an interesting and at times moving story and I could understand her need to identify with the culture and traditions she felt she had lost.
February 9, 2019
I found this a fascinating book. Not so much the story although that was powerful in and of itself, but rather the way the author chose to write it, keeping us very much in the moment by sharing her inner monologue with us. All those things one thinks and never verbalises, makes it more honest and not always flattering, veering from ambiguous and ambivalent to vehement and visceral. Great read.
June 30, 2021
My Fathers’ Daughter is a intimate and personal memoir of Eritrean-British journalist, Hannah Azieb Pool, who returns to Eritrea at the age of 30 to meet her family for the first time. Sounds simple enough, right? Not at all. Hannah was adopted as a young girl from an orphanage and raised by her new family in Manchester, with the understanding that her biological parents were no longer alive. She, at 21 years of age, then receives a letter from Eritrea from a man who claims to be her brother. Hannah, not quite ready to deal with what this might mean, puts the letter away and doesn’t give it any thought until she’s thirty. Then, she goes on a trip to Eritrea, but what a trippppp.
This is a moving recounting of what it means to be adopted, having roots in one country, a family in another. She describes the confusion, how it feels to come to know what she always believed to be fact was not at all true. She returns to Eritrea to be exposed to a culture both foreign and familiar to her, people who have known and loved her all her life without ever having met her.
This book is full of emotion, I was a total mess reading it. I know my people to be emotional, but not easily moved. So when tears are involved, it’s DEEP. It’s deeper than deep. And the exhaustion Hannah must have felt, I can hardly fathom/ But Hannah writes with honesty, and exposes us to the inner workings of her mind as she reconciles the new discoveries and battles with maintaining what seems like loyalty to the family that took her in.
It’s not very often that Keren, a city in Eritrea, gets to be in the limelight. But it is refreshing to see Keren (where my roots lie) showcased alongside the capital city, Asmara (with its famous hustle and bustle attributed to Italy’s influence under colonization).
This is a story about adoption, (re)discovery, family, and love in Eritrea that will surely be a welcome addition to your bookshelves if you’re a memoir junkie like myself!
This is a moving recounting of what it means to be adopted, having roots in one country, a family in another. She describes the confusion, how it feels to come to know what she always believed to be fact was not at all true. She returns to Eritrea to be exposed to a culture both foreign and familiar to her, people who have known and loved her all her life without ever having met her.
This book is full of emotion, I was a total mess reading it. I know my people to be emotional, but not easily moved. So when tears are involved, it’s DEEP. It’s deeper than deep. And the exhaustion Hannah must have felt, I can hardly fathom/ But Hannah writes with honesty, and exposes us to the inner workings of her mind as she reconciles the new discoveries and battles with maintaining what seems like loyalty to the family that took her in.
It’s not very often that Keren, a city in Eritrea, gets to be in the limelight. But it is refreshing to see Keren (where my roots lie) showcased alongside the capital city, Asmara (with its famous hustle and bustle attributed to Italy’s influence under colonization).
This is a story about adoption, (re)discovery, family, and love in Eritrea that will surely be a welcome addition to your bookshelves if you’re a memoir junkie like myself!
July 2, 2020
Je n'ai aucun souvenir de pourquoi je me suis procuré ce livre à la base, ça fait déjà un bon moment, je me l'était commandé à la librairie suite à ... (???). C'était donc sans aucune attente que j'ai débuté la lecture et que j'y ai découvert un récit d'adoption d'une journaliste britannique née en Érythrée, Hannah Pool, adoptée à six mois par un couple blanc américain et britannique. Durant une partie de sa vie, elle pensait être orpheline, mais elle découvre que ce n'est plus le cas et après bien des années de report de visite de sa famille de sang, elle s'embarque pour l'Érythrée, un pays dont elle ne connaît presque rien, ni la langue, ni sa famille.
Le récit aborde de nombreux enjeux: du racisme dans son pays d'origine à des questions de classe en Érythrée, un peu des questions de colonisation, beaucoup de question de language, de famille créée et d'appartenance. C'est un récit très sensible, à la première personne, qui tente de communiquer tous les sentiments que la narratrice éprouve: le stress immense des rencontres, la confusion par rapport à la langue ou aux (très très) nombreux membres de la famille, aux petits clashs de culture, mais aussi la dépression immense qui a suivi cette rencontre et la difficulté qu'elle a eu de reprendre sa vie "normale" après ces rencontres et ce séjour en Érythrée.
Ce n'est effectivement pas un pays dont on entend souvent parler, la narratrice nous donne toutefois beaucoup de pistes et d'aide pour comprendre un peu son histoire et l'épilogue donne une très bonne idée de la situation du pays deux, trois ans après son voyage et (en mars 2008) les troubles qui l'empêche d'y retourner.
Je n'ai peut-être aucune idée de pourquoi j'ai commandé ce livre à la base, mais c'était un récit émotif et intéressant sur l'adoption, l'Érythrée et les limites et (parfois surprises) du langage.
Le récit aborde de nombreux enjeux: du racisme dans son pays d'origine à des questions de classe en Érythrée, un peu des questions de colonisation, beaucoup de question de language, de famille créée et d'appartenance. C'est un récit très sensible, à la première personne, qui tente de communiquer tous les sentiments que la narratrice éprouve: le stress immense des rencontres, la confusion par rapport à la langue ou aux (très très) nombreux membres de la famille, aux petits clashs de culture, mais aussi la dépression immense qui a suivi cette rencontre et la difficulté qu'elle a eu de reprendre sa vie "normale" après ces rencontres et ce séjour en Érythrée.
Ce n'est effectivement pas un pays dont on entend souvent parler, la narratrice nous donne toutefois beaucoup de pistes et d'aide pour comprendre un peu son histoire et l'épilogue donne une très bonne idée de la situation du pays deux, trois ans après son voyage et (en mars 2008) les troubles qui l'empêche d'y retourner.
Je n'ai peut-être aucune idée de pourquoi j'ai commandé ce livre à la base, mais c'était un récit émotif et intéressant sur l'adoption, l'Érythrée et les limites et (parfois surprises) du langage.
August 14, 2022
This is a lovely and rich story of family, hearth, and homecomings from an adoptees perspective. The writing simply takes you there and tells the story without pretense. Hannah Pool captivates the feelings/memories of rural homelife with her writing.
To hear an adoptees story, in her own words, was enlightening. I can't be alone in having friends and relatives who were adopted. It's heartening to hear more frequent stories of reunions with a now more open attitude towards unifying birth parents/families and children. It peaked my attention when Hannah mentions the "gratefulness" adoptees are burdened to feel. Someone I know, whose adopted, recently told me how they "always have to feel oh so grateful". I appreciate her honesty, describing the difficult feelings, of balancing the desire to meet biological family with the worries of hurt feelings in the adoptive family. It's also a satisfying read in that she was fortunate to have an understanding and supportive adoptive father and a good reunion experience.
Mostly, I enjoyed reading of the time spent with her family in their home villages. I'm so happy she ventured out to them. It stirred in me many happy recollections of travel and of being a foreigner and trying to fit in, family reunions, and rural life. I loved the depictions of her family reunions and dramas set against the rural, African background. It's those simple things which matter. Also, her descriptions of needing time, on the return, to "unpack" everything, the memories, the goodbyes, and that feeling of loss upon return.
To hear an adoptees story, in her own words, was enlightening. I can't be alone in having friends and relatives who were adopted. It's heartening to hear more frequent stories of reunions with a now more open attitude towards unifying birth parents/families and children. It peaked my attention when Hannah mentions the "gratefulness" adoptees are burdened to feel. Someone I know, whose adopted, recently told me how they "always have to feel oh so grateful". I appreciate her honesty, describing the difficult feelings, of balancing the desire to meet biological family with the worries of hurt feelings in the adoptive family. It's also a satisfying read in that she was fortunate to have an understanding and supportive adoptive father and a good reunion experience.
Mostly, I enjoyed reading of the time spent with her family in their home villages. I'm so happy she ventured out to them. It stirred in me many happy recollections of travel and of being a foreigner and trying to fit in, family reunions, and rural life. I loved the depictions of her family reunions and dramas set against the rural, African background. It's those simple things which matter. Also, her descriptions of needing time, on the return, to "unpack" everything, the memories, the goodbyes, and that feeling of loss upon return.
August 18, 2021
I heard the author speak at the Hay Festival on line earlier this year. Her talk sparked my interest and I was not disappointed when I read her book. It is a deeply emotional story exploring issues of adoption, family, identity and culture and also grief. The author manages to hold her grief in tension with the recognition of what ifs. What if she hadn't been adopted? What if she hadn't met her birth father and family etc.
As well as discovering and meeting her birth family, the author also had to respond to the cultural differences, which is a huge challenge for anyone brought up outside their culture of origin. I thought the author was very courageous to meet her birth family on her own and then to write about it as well. I thought the book was very hard hitting but it was also deeply engaging.
As well as discovering and meeting her birth family, the author also had to respond to the cultural differences, which is a huge challenge for anyone brought up outside their culture of origin. I thought the author was very courageous to meet her birth family on her own and then to write about it as well. I thought the book was very hard hitting but it was also deeply engaging.
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