Adopted Ed

Adopted Ed
Written Darren Maddern
Published at Oxford Bourne

About the book

ADOPTED ED is a simple, easy-to-read and understand children’s book with important underlying messages of personal empowerment and social pressures and acceptance.

It focuses on the life of Eddie, an adopted little boy, who is just like every other boy and girl. At school, when he is teased by bullies about being adopted, his mom offers words of wisdom, which ultimately gives him self-confidence to deal with the situation.

Who is Darren Maddern?

Darren Maddern is just one of the many millions of adopted people throughout the world today.

Born in England, Darren was adopted when he was only 10 days old by Don and Dolly Maddern, an American military couple who were stationed at an American Air Force base just outside of Oxford.

After spending three years in England, the Madderns were transferred to Tehran, Iran where they settled for the next five years and where Darren attended first and second grades. When Darren completed second grade, the Madderns were transferred again, this time to Fayetteville, North Carolina. Shortly after arriving in North Carolina, Darren was naturalized as an American citizen. Three years later, the Madderns moved one last time to Colorado, where Darren spent the rest of his formative years.

The Madderns made the decision to tell Darren he was adopted at an early age. Like many adoptees, Darren became curious about his birth parents. Sympathetic to the feelings of his adoptive parents, when Darren turned 18, he secretly hired a private investigator to learn the address of his biological grandparents, who were still living in the Oxford area of England. He contacted them through a letter and enclosed a separate letter with the request that it be passed along to his biological mother. Shortly thereafter he received a phone call, and knew immediately who it was from the accent on the other end. This was the first contact with his birth mother.
During the emotional phone call, a plan for a reunion was discussed. However, after giving it serious thought Darren just felt he wasn't emotionally ready. It would be another four years before Darren would make his fateful trip overseas.

A 22 year old more emotionally mature Darren flew back to England to meet both his biological mother and grandparents. The reunion was everything he could have wished for.

At 26, Darren found his biological father and went back again to England to meet him. During this visit he discovered he has two half-brothers.

To this day, Darren still enjoys a close relationship with his British family. He also had an extremely close relationship with his adoptive parents, who always encouraged his journey through life.

Throughout his life Maddern has been asked about being adopted. Through candidly sharing his story, he’s helped many adoptees, parents of adopted children and parents considering adoption.

ADOPTED ED is dedicated to both his adopted and biological parents with a special dedication to his mom, Dolly Maddern who passed away in 2000 and his pops, Don Maddern who joined her in 2009. It's also dedicated to every adopted man, woman and child to remind them that they too are indeed – SPECIAL.

My Thoughts

November is National Adoption Month.

And the celebrate this, I had the opportunity of reviewing a brand new book about adoption title Adopted Ed.

The drawings are fabulous and not too crowded.   They go well with the text of the story.   The story itself introduce adoption and present the fact that a child who has been adopted because he is special.   However, I am a bit disappointed about a section of the book when the child goes back to his bully and says “My parents chose me, yours were stuck with you!”.   Hummm!   How can I say this.   As much as it is true that adoption is special, I don’t approve on how the bullying is dealt with.    Honestly, I see it as though Ed becomes a bully himself while he says this.    True, the kid wasn’t nice with him but I think that finding another way to deal with the situation would have been better.

The book teaches that adoption is an act of love and that no matter where the child comes from this child is a gift for the family who decided to adopt him.

We have not adopted any kids and neither my husband or I are adopted.  But somewhere in our extended family there are people who have been adopted.  We even have some friends who adopted overseas – three different families (Thailand, Vietnam and South Africa).    Part of me would love to adopt a child from Asia, Africa or India one of these days.   We don’t know if God will open the doors for this but we know that every kids are special to him whether they are born to you or not.  

At the end of the book, you have examples of adopted kids who became famous later on.   I enjoyed have this information included in the book.

Visit www.AdoptedEd.cmo for more details.

Disclaimer: Thanks to One2One for sending me the featured product for review purpose. I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way.All opinions expressed here are only my own.