Before We Were Yours

Before We Were Yours is a historical and contemporary fiction that deals with the scandal of child trafficking and illegal adoption in Tennessee in the 1930s. It showed how the Foss children and other kids where forced to live in an orphanage managed by Ms. Tann and thereafter be sold to other people, making them believe that their parents have completely abandoned them, when in fact they were stolen. The book simultaneously narrates the present day, with Avery Stafford, granddaughter of one the Foss children, she started digging the past when she met May Crandall at a nursing home. Will what she discovers affect her family's reputation and how she look and know her grandmother.

This book is so heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time. Based on the true accounts of Tennessee Children’s Home Society survivors, Lisa Wingate created an incredible story of fortitude, love, sacrifice and resilience.

I was honestly slowly reading the book in its first chapters because I was not still connected with the characters, but when the Foss children arrived at Mrs. Murphy's house, I know there is something terribly wrong. That is when I realized Wingate's writing style is so engrossing. I shed a tear when May Crandall and Judy Stafford were reunited, it is so poignantly written, it gave me a relief that they will be together and every day will be Sisters Day. I was rooting for May since the beginning and it breaks my heart every time one of them is separated and sold to other people. It is also good that Avery defied what is expected of her and chose what she really wants to do.