The Lost Child of Philomena Lee: A Mother, Her Son, and a Fifty-Year Search (2)

Synopsis

When she fell pregnant as a teenager in Ireland in 1952, Philomena Lee was sent to the convent at Roscrea in Co. Tipperary to be looked after as a fallen woman. She cared for her baby for three years until the Church took him from her and sold him, like countless others, to America for adoption. Coerced into signing a document promising never to attempt to see her child again, she nonetheless spent the next fifty years secretly searching for him, unaware that he was searching for her from across the Atlantic. Philomena's son, renamed Michael Hess, grew up to be a top Washington lawyer and a leading Republican official in the Reagan and Bush administrations. But he was a gay man in a homophobic party where he had to conceal not only his sexuality but, eventually, the fact that he had AIDs. With little time left, he returned to Ireland and the convent where he was born: his desperate quest to find his mother before he died left a legacy that was to unfold with unexpected consequences for all involved. The Lost Child of Philomena Lee is the tale of a mother and a son whose lives were scarred by the forces of hypocrisy on both sides of the Atlantic and of the secrets they were forced to keep. A compelling narrative of human love and loss, Martin Sixsmith's moving account is both heartbreaking yet ultimately redemptive.

Copyright:

2009

Book Details

Book Quality:

Publisher Quality

ISBN-13:

9780230753211

Related ISBNs:

9780330518369

Publisher:

Pan Macmillan

Date of Addition:

04/04/19

Copyrighted By:

Martin Sixsmith

Adult content:

No

Language:

English

Has Image Descriptions:

No

Categories:

Nonfiction, Biographies and Memoirs, Parenting and Family, Politics and Government

Reading Age:

18–18

Submitted By:

Bookshare Staff

Usage Restrictions:

This is a copyrighted book.