Monday, January 5, 2009

The Lost Daughters of China or Counselor

The Lost Daughters of China: Abandoned Girls, Their Journey to America, and the Search for a Missing Past

Author: Karin Evans

"Breathtaking-an unforgettable story."-Iris Chang, author of The Rape of Nanking

In 1997 journalist Karin Evans walked into an orphanage in southern China and met her new daughter, a beautiful one-year-old baby girl. In this fateful moment Evans became part of a profound, increasingly common human drama that links abandoned Chinese girls with foreigners who have traveled many miles to complete their families.

At once a compelling personal narrative and an evocative portrait of contemporary China, The Lost Daughters of China has also served as an invaluable guide for thousands of readers as they navigated the process of adopting from China. However, much has changed in terms of the Chinese government's policies on adoption since this book was originally published and in this revised and updated edition Evans addresses these developments. Also new to this edition is a riveting chapter in which she describes her return to China in 2000 to adopt her second daughter who was nearly three at the time. Many of the first girls to be adopted from China are now in the teens (China only opened its doors to adoption in the 1990s), and this edition includes accounts of their experiences growing up in the US and, in some cases, of returning to China in search of their roots.

Illuminating the real-life stories behind the statistics, The Lost Daughters of China is an unforgettable account of the red thread that winds form China's orphanages to loving families around the globe.



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Counselor: A Life at the Edge of History

Author: Ted Sorensen

An intimate, deeply revealing memoir from John F. Kennedy's legendary right-hand man.

In January 1953 the newly-elected Senator John F. Kennedy hired a young Nebraskan lawyer named Theodore Sorensen as his legislative assistant. Sorensen quickly rose up the ranks in JFK's senate office, from research aide to speechwriter to campaigner and advisor, eventually working closely with JFK on his speeches and books, including Profiles in Courage, and encouraging JFK's interest in the vice presidential nomination. Though JFK's pursuit of that nomination fell short at the 1956 Democratic Convention, he had emerged as a prominent national figure; and JFK and Sorensen traveled over the next three years to all fifty states exploring his prospects for the presidential nomination in 1960. Upon his election, Kennedy appointed Sorensen as his Special Counsel-a role that allowed him to serve as the President's own lawyer, speechwriter, and trusted confidante.

Sorensen recounts in thrilling detail his experience advising JFK through some of the most dramatic moments in American history, including the Cuban Missile Crisis, when JFK requested that Sorensen draft a letter to Khrushchev at the most critical point of the world's first nuclear confrontation. Sorensen was immersed in everything from civil rights to the decision to go to the moon, and he also had a hand in JFK's most important speeches.

Illuminating, revelatory, and utterly compelling, Counselor is the brilliant long-awaited memoir from a man who shaped the presidency and legacy of JFK as no one else could.

The New York Times - Jack Rosenthal

Sorensen, much more than a speechwriter, grew so close that some came to call him the deputy president. After the assassination, his act of mourning was to write Kennedy, a rigorous history. Now, four decades later, just as he turns 80 and seven years after a stroke that virtually destroyed his vision, he has written a different kind of book. Much of it is inescapably about J.F.K., and it includes some discreet disclosures and funny historical footnotes. But primarily this is a book, a touching book, about a mellower Sorensen

The Washington Post - Ted Widmer

Sorensen has written on Kennedy before—his 1965 opus, Kennedy, was one of the first to etch the legend into stone, and he has been writing ever since on subjects ranging from foreign policy to table tennis…But this book is different from his previous efforts. It is as much about Sorensen as Kennedy, more personal than anything he has written before. It is full of new information about both men, and in a world saturated with Kennedy stories both over-familiar and apocryphal, that's saying something…This book is instantly essential for any student of the period. It fills gaps in the historical record; it vividly conveys life inside the administration; and it generously dishes anecdotes

Publishers Weekly

Sorensen begins this audio sounding like a tired old man, with a gravelly voice and narrow vocal range; but as he becomes livelier and more engaged in his own narrative, listeners do too. A legislative assistant to Senator John F. Kennedy, Sorensen became JFK's speechwriter and closest advisor throughout the Kennedy presidency. Sorensen is most animated describing what he sees as the three major legacies of the Kennedy years: avoiding nuclear war through his handling of the Cuban missile crisis, supporting the civil rights movement, and competing with the Soviets in space. He deplores the Bush administration and ends with the fervent hope for new Democratic leadership to restore America's moral authority in the world and aspirations for a better, more equal life at home. This is a piece of history told by a passionate participant who is a fine writer and most engaging reader. A HarperCollins hardcover. (June)

Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.



Table of Contents:

Prologue 1

Pt. 1 Lincoln, Nebraska, 1928-1951

1 Roots 13

2 Mother 22

3 Father 34

4 Childhood and Siblings 49

5 Education 59

6 Conscience 67

Pt. 2 Washington, D.C., 1951-1964

7 Move to Washington, D.C. 89

8 Joining Senator Kennedy 95

9 Relationship with JFK 102

10 My Perspective on JFK's Personal Life 116

11 My Evolving Role on JFK's Senate Staff 124

12 Speechwriting 130

13 My Role in Profiles in Courage 144

14 A Catholic Candidate for President? 156

15 Senator Kennedy's Quest for the Presidency 167

16 The 1960-1961 Presidential Transition 198

17 Special Counsel to the President 203

18 The President's Speeches 215

19 President Kennedy's Ministry of Talent 228

20 My Relations with Vice President Lyndon Johnson 241

21 My Relations with President Kennedy's Family 250

22 Kennedy's Civil Rights Initiative 270

23 The Cuban Missile Crisis 285

24 President Kennedy's Foreign Policy 310

25 My Role in Press Relations 341

26 Planning for JFK's Reelection and Second Term 346

27 The Death of President Kennedy 360

28 President Johnson's 1963 Transition 378

Pt. 3 New York City, 1965-2007

29 Return to Private Life and Authorship 397

30 New Life in New York 410

31 Practicing Law 422

32 My Continuing Involvement in Politics 452

33 My 1977 Nomination for Director of Central Intelligence 484

34 Family and Health 504

Epilogue: Reflections, Regrets, and Reconsiderations 519

Acknowledgments 533

Index 535

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