The Girl I Am, Was, and Never Will Be

A MICHAEL L. PRINTZ HONOR BOOK • Strikingly honest, this speculative memoir explores the rarely depicted experience of growing up as a mixed transracial adoptee and offers an insightful look into the discovery of one’s own identity.

“A fantastical, transcendent memory collage that shirks convention in search of what is real and true about familial bonds.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Breathtakingly beautiful.”—Kimberly McKee, PhD, author of Disrupting Kinship: Transnational Politics of Korean Adoption in the United States

Part memoir, part speculative fiction, The Girl I Am, Was, and Never Will Be tells the true story of author Shannon Gibney’s experience growing up as the adopted Black daughter of white parents in America alongside the fictional story of Erin Powers, the name Shannon was given at birth by the white woman who put her up for adoption.

At its core, the novel is a tale of two girls on two different timelines, occasionally bridged by a mysterious portal and their shared search for a complete picture of their origins.

Gibney surrounds those stories with reproductions of her own adoption documents, letters, family photographs, interviews, medical records, and brief essays on the absurdities of the adoptee experience. The end result is a unique portrait of an American experience rarely depicted in any form.