No Biking in the House Without a Helmet

It's hard to decide what's more infectious about this production--Melissa Fay Greene's writing or narrator Coleen Marlo's enthusiasm. Greene demonstrates her prowess at transforming nonfiction into a gripping story. In this book she writes about her family of four biological and five adopted children, and the joy and baggage that accompany them all. Whether discussing "boingy hair," her Ethiopian adoptees' athletic skills, her puzzlement about the value of Super Bowl tickets, or her children's travails with cable pornography, Greene excels. So does Marlo, who reads with a fervor that makes the listener feel like a guest in Greene's home. Marlo perfectly mixes the family's happiness and inevitable rocky moments in an endearing way, making a wonderful book even better. D.J.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award (c) AudioFile 2011, Portland, Maine

Starred review from February 28, 2011
With four children of their own, Atlanta journalist Greene (There Is No Me Without You) and her husband, a criminal defense attorney, gradually adopted five more—one from Bulgaria and four from Ethiopia—to create a roiling, largehearted family unit. In her whimsical, hilarious account, she pokes fun at her own initial cluelessness regarding the adoption process, which the couple began after Greene suffered a miscarriage in her mid-40s; they procured an "adoption doctor" to advise them on the risks of adopting institutionalized babies from Russian and Bulgarian orphanages (e.g., the baby's head measurements and appearance in videos might indicate developmental problems). After several trips to a rural Bulgarian orphanage, they brought home a four-year-old Roma boy they renamed Jesse; Greene writes frankly about her own moments of "post-adoption panic" and doubts about attachment. Subsequently, as her older children headed out to college, new ones arrived: the humanitarian HIV/AIDS crisis in Ethiopia resolved the couple to adopt healthy, five-year-old Helen, orphaned when her family was decimated by the disease; then nine-year-old Fisseha, and two brothers, Daniel and Yosef, whom Greene's older biological son Lee befriended while working at another Ethiopian orphanage. The family often felt like a "group home," as Greene depicts engagingly, yet despite periods of tension and strife, such as the discovery of living parents and sibling rivalry, Greene captures the family's triumphant shared delight in one another's differences.