When You Never Said Goodbye: An Adoptee’s Search for Her Birth Mother: A Novel in Poems and Journal Entries

Liz MacLane is just eighteen when she goes off to New York University to follow her dream of studying poetry. But there is another dream that might be within her grasp as well — that of finding her birth mother. Liz knows little of her mother, but she knows she lived in New York City. When one wishes for something so long, one sometimes sees answers where they don’t exist — like in a stranger’s face or voice, and Liz sometimes falls into that, seeing the mother she wants to find on a subway train or a park bench. But she continues on her quest with the help and encouragement of a small cadre of family and friends. Her journey takes her to some unexpected and difficult truths.

Author Meg Kearney has crafted an engaging novel that tells a story many will relate to. Not only adoptees but any who have life questions for which they seek answers. Based on her own experiences, Kearney’s choice to tell the story in journal entries and poems — free verse and structured — is very effective. We not only see Liz’s story, but we see her develop as a poet and an independent woman. This is a winner.