The Secret of Me
A Novel in Poems
Meg Kearney

Fourteen-year-old Lizzie and her older brother and sister were adopted as infants, a fact of life in the McLane household. But dry facts rarely encompass feelings, and what it feels like to be adopted is something Lizzie never dares openly discuss with her loving parents—or with outsiders, including her boyfriend. In this vivid, heartfelt tale, told entirely through her own poetry, Lizzie finds the courage to speak the secret of her identity.

An Afterword by the author discusses her experience as an adopted child and how writing can help make sense of one’s life. Also included are a Guide to this Book’s Poetics, Some Poems Lizzie Loves (reprints of poems by Lucille Clifton, Hayden Carruth, Anne Sexton, Donald Hall, and others), and Recommended Books and Links about adoption and poetry. 

“A sincere, at times poignant, novel-in-verse reads like a memoir…. A real balance of personal exploration as an adoptee and new teenage emotions creates a powerful blend in a warm character ready to connect and sustain that bond to readers.…[Adolescents] will get a good dose of real poetry with unique and inspiring language.… Substantive backmatter… makes this a first-rate offering.”
—Kirkus Reviews

Meg Kearney is the author of An Unkindness of Ravens, When You Never Said Goodbye and The Girl in the Mirror. She is the director of the Solstice Creative Writing Programs of Pine Manor College in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. 

Paperback / $13.95 (Can $18.95) / ISBN 978-0-89255-336-5 / 136 pages / Young Adult