All You Can Ever Know: A memoir of adoption

(Paperback)

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What does it mean to lose your roots within your culture, within your family And what happens when you find them

Nicole Chung was born severely premature, placed for adoption by her Korean parents, and raised by a white family in a sheltered Oregon town. From childhood, she heard the story of her adoption as a comforting, pre- packaged myth. She believed that her biological parents had made the ultimate sacrifice in the hope of giving her a better life, that forever feeling slightly out of place was her fate as a transracial adoptee. But as Nicole grew up - facing prejudice her adoptive family couldn't see, finding her identity as an Asian American and as a writer - she began to wonder if the story she'd been told was the whole truth.

With warmth, candor, and startling insight, Nicole Chung tells of her search for the people who gave her up, which coincided with the birth of her own child. All You Can Ever Know is a profound, moving chronicle of surprising connections and the repercussions of unearthing painful family secrets. Vital reading for anyone who has ever struggled to figure out where they belong.

Author Bio

Nicole Chung was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest. Her debut memoir, All You Can Ever Know, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, long-listed for the PEN Open Book Award, and named a Best Book of the Year by nearly two-dozen outlets including The Washington Post, Time and The Boston Globe. She has written for The New York Times, New York Times Magazine, GQ, The Atlantic, Longreads, Buzzfeed, Bitch, Vulture, Hazlitt, and Shondaland, among others. She is the editor in chief of Catapult magazine.