Blogs/Web Pages/Articles I felt a strange grief when I found my birth mother': Jackie Kay on The Adoption Papers Jackie Kay 2021 The poet explains how researching her history led her to tell the story from three perspectives: the birth mother, the adoptive mother and the daughter External Website

Autobiography/Memoir Shadows in Paradise Carolann Dowding 2013 Shadows in Parise (2013) is Carolann Dowding’s account of her search for her biological family. Carolann Dowding grew up as n Redland City, Queensland during the 1950s. Although happy with her adoptive family she wanted to find out her family history. Through her search, Carolann found out in 1987 that her birth mother, Edna, was working at a cattle station at the time of Carolann’s birth. It took longer to find her biological father and Dowding enlisted the help of a private investigator in 2002. She was 54 when she found out she has a birth sister living in Sydney. External Website

Writers Philip Melanchthon 1497-1560 Philip Melanchthon (1497 – 1560) was a German Lutheran reformer, collaborator with Martin Luther, the first systematic theologian of the Protestant Reformation, intellectual leader of the Lutheran Reformation, and an influential designer of educational systems. Philip Melanchthon was born Philipp Schwartzerdt in Bretten, southwest Germany to pious parents, Barbara Reuter and Georg Schwartzerd. In 1508, Philip’s father and maternal grandfather died. After consultation with relatives, Barbara sent her three sons to Pforzheim—12 miles south of Bretten—and a Latin school there run by Georg Simler. While in Pforzheim, the children lived with a relative, Elisabeth Reuchlin. Twelve months later, when he was 12, Philip began his university education at the University of Heidelberg, where he lived with Pallas Spangel and studied rhetoric and astronomy. The boy obtained his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1511 and applied to do a masters in theology but was rejected. From the University of Heidelberg, Philip studied philosophy and jurisprudence, Latin, maths, astronomy and astrology at the University of Tubingen and began teaching there at the age of 17. In 1518, at the age of 21, Melanchthon became a professor of Greek at the University of Wittenberg. Melanchthon continued his studies in theology at Wittenberg and in 1519 graduated with a Bachelor of Theology. He worked as an academic at Wittenberg for 42 years. External Website

Autobiography/Memoir Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass 1845 Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass is an 1845 memoir and treatise on abolition written by famous orator and former slave Frederick Douglass during his time in Lynn, Massachusetts. It is generally held to be the most famous of a number of narratives written by former slaves during the same period. In factual detail, the text describes the events of his life and is considered to be one of the most influential pieces of literature to fuel the abolitionist movement of the early 19th century in the United States. External Website

Authors K Colin Kaepernick ➝ Lloyd Kelly ➝ Back to Top

Films/Videos Evelyn 2017 Nine-year-old Evelyn Doyle (Sophie Vavasseur) and her two brothers, Maurice (Hugh MacDonagh) and Dermot (Niall Beagan) are motherless when their mother abandons the marriage to a drunkard out-of-work father Desmond Doyle (Pierce Brosnan). When Desmond's mother-in-law (Claire Mullan) reports the situation to the authorities, a judge decides the children are prohibited by law to being left in broken homes; they are placed in Church-run orphanages. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Frankie Graham Norton 2024 Frankie (2024) by Irish comedian and television host, Graham Norton, tells the story of Frankie Powell. Frankie is being cared for by Damian in her small London flat. Damian listens as Frankie tells the story of her life which includes being orphaned at the age 11 and running off to London as soon as she can. The narrative travels from post-war Ireland to 1960s New York & reveals Frankie’s resilience & endurance. External Website

Fiction by Care Experienced authors Mountain in My Shoe. Louise Beech 2016 After years of abuse, Bernadette makes the decision to leave her husband, only to find that he is missing … along with a little boy she’d befriended years earlier. Also missing is his lifebook, the only thing that holds the answers. With the help of Conor’s foster mum, Bernadette must face her own past, her husband’s secrets and a future she never dared imagine in order to find them all. A psychological thriller and emotive examination of the meaning of family … and just how far we’re willing to go for the people we love. External Website

Autobiography/Memoir A Chip Off What Block? Laurie Humphreys 2007 Tells of the life of Laurie Humphries, a child migrant who lived his early life without a family, an orphan who lost touch with his brothers and sisters when he came to Australia, and of his subsequent hard life of ' work, eat, and sleep'; then rise to become an long-time active council member. External Website

Writers Alex Wheatle 1963-2025 Books and information on author Alex Wheatle, also known as the Brixton Bard. Born in 1963, was in a children's home for most of his childhood. Wheatle's early books reflect on his experience in the children's home, and on making the transition to an independent life. He was awarded a prestigious MBE in 2008 for services to literature, and in 2016 won The Guardian's Children's Fiction prize for his novel Crongton Knights. External Website

Films/Videos The Secret of Roan Inish 1994 The Secret of Roan Inish (1994) is set in 1946 and centred on the Irish folktales of selkies, or seals which can shed their skins and become human. Some believe the Coneely family has selkie blood running through it. Fiona Coneely (Jeni Courtney) is about 10 years old and sent to live with her paternal grandparents after her mother dies and her father is struggling to care for her. She listens to the old stories and believes she says her long lost young brother being cared for by seals. External Website

Authors W Wayward ➝ Who is Erin Carter? ➝ When Hope Calls ➝ Warrior Nun ➝ Wire in the Blood ➝ White House Farm ➝ Who Killed Sara ➝ Winter ➝ Will Trent (TV series) ➝ We Hunt Together ➝ Why Women Kill ➝ Water Under the Bridge (tv show) ➝ Back to Top

Non Fiction Behind The Wall. The Women of the Destitute Asylum Adelaide, 1852-1918 Mary Geyer 1994 Behind The Wall: The Women of the Destitute Asylum, 1852-1918 (1994) by Mary Geyer is a history of some women who once lived at the Destitute Asylum in Adelaide, South Australia. According to Mary Geyer, in March 1856, there were "65 women, 30 men and 43 children" housed at the Destitute Asylum. Amongst the vignettes of women Geyer includes in her book are those of woman born in the Asylum's Lying-in home. For example, Olive Doran (b. 1885) went into kinship care after her mother unmarried died, and Ada Deare (b. 1900) went into foster care. Adelaide’s Migration Museum (opened in 1986) now occupies the site on which the Destitute Asylum once existed. External Website

Television Shows London Spy 2015 Alex and Danny are from different backgrounds, different lifestyles. Just as they are settling into a committed relationship, Alex disappears. Danny then commits himself to finding who killed Alex. At the heart of the story is an account of informal adoption. External Website

Authors W Integrating personal and professional experiences: Seven phases to integrating loss and grief. ➝ Oliver Twisted: the origins of Lord Voldemort in the Dickensian orphan. ➝ Lost Boys and Recovered Classics: Literary and Social Memory in Lorenzo Carcaterra's Sleepers (1995) ➝ Back to Top

Autobiography/Memoir Orphanage Boy Szablicki Ryszard 2015 Ryszard Szablicki was born in Melbourne on 5 June 1952 and immediately placed in a foundling home by his mother. He remained in institutional care for over ten years.In Orphanage Boy:Through the Eyes of Innocence, Ryszard recounts his early life in several Catholic institutions through the eyes of that boy, naive and overwhelmed by the perverse corruption and indifference of a system he couldn't hope to understand.In 1996, he joined a class action against the brutality and abuse of one of these institutions. A federal Senate inquiry followed in 2004, investigating similar allegations. Finally, Ryszard received an unreserved apology for these abuses and some peace of mind. External Website

Artists Arshile Gorky Arshile Gorky (1904 – 1948) was an Armenian-American painter who had a seminal influence on Abstract Expressionism. In 1915, the boy and his mother and three sisters escaped Lake Van and he travelled to the United States as a sixteen year old. He spent most his life as a national of the United States. Along with Mark Rothko, Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning, Gorky has been hailed as one of the most powerful American painters of the 20th century. As such, his works were often speculated to have been informed by the suffering and loss he experienced in the Armenian Genocide. External Website

Authors Z The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry (Paperback) ➝ Bridge of Clay ➝ The Book Thief (novel) ➝ Back to Top

Autobiography/Memoir Dirty Laundry Lily Arthur 2022 Dirty Laundry (2022) by Lily Arthur tells the story of a pregnant, unmarried 17-year-old being sent to a notorious Madalene Laundry in Woolowin, Brisbane, Australia. The year was 1967 and so Lily Arthur was, as she writes “caught between an era of women's liberation and the draconian ideology that young women should be punished for deviating from society's 'moral codes'.” Lily’s son was put up for adoption. Lily Arthur later became an activist, joining with other women in Australia whose babies had been forced from them into adoption. She includes some of this story in her book, and concludes with the national inquiry and national apology by then Prime Minister Julia Gillard, https://www.ag.gov.au/families-and-marriage/national-apology-forced-adoptions External Website

Films/Videos Fugitive Pieces 2007 Fugitive Pieces is based on the 1996 award winning novel by Canadian writer, Anne Michaels (b. 1958). The film tells the story of Jakob who is 7 when he is orphaned in Poland during WWII. He hides in the forests and is rescued by a Greek archeologist who spirits him away to Greece and safety. Fugitive Pieces was produced by Robert Lantos and directed by Jeremy Podeswa. It premiered as the opening film for the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival. External Website