It’s hard to review a memoir because how can you put a rating on someone’s life experience? In this case the low rating is for the poor writing and editing. What could have been a fantastic and gripping memoir was thoroughly let down. Such a shame.

Patti was adopted and she goes on a hunt to determine who she is and where she came from. As someone whose mother was adopted, I was interested in the process that Patti went through to uncover the system and steps that were taken that lead to her adoption. There are a lot of people mentioned and at times I struggled to keep track, but I thought this was a well written and heartfelt account of Patti’s experience. Ultimately, it’s a story of love and family. The one we’re given and the one we choose.

This was such a great read and is very well written. The author went into great detail and made it relatable to many. I really enjoyed this book!

A DNF for me I just couldn’t get into the style of writing on this one. I’ll try give it another go some other time

The premise of this book is so interesting (considering what it means to have a birthday and what the implications can be for not having that piece of information about yourself) and I really wanted to enjoy the experience of reading it, but I found the structure of the book quite confusing. It was hard to keep track of all the threads of storylines and the book, at times, felt structured more like the way you tell a story verbally to someone (with tangents and double backing). Perhaps I'm just not the right reader for this one.

Although I enjoyed this story, I found the narrative slightly confusing. It skipped between different timelines, a device I often enjoy in a book, but I found it tricky to keep the thread that ran through the timelines and characters.

⭐️⭐️/5. The Girl With Three Birthdays: An Adopted Daughter’s Memoir of Tiaras, Tough Truths and Tall Tales by Patti Eddington. Thank you to the publisher, the author and NetGalley for this advanced reader copy. I am an adopted daughter, and I was very excited to read this new book. Sadly, it was not a hit at all. Like my adoption, Ms. Eddington’s adoption was closed. She was not provided with much biological information, so eventually (also like me), she turned to Ancestry.com. Her story took a big turn from mine then though. It was filled with secrets and scandal. Her loving parents were not quite what they seemed to be. My issue with this memoir is that it was poorly written. It’s filled with rambling memories with no cohesiveness. It was a struggle to read. Thumbs down. #bookstagram #bookgram #reading #books #netgalley #adoption #bookworm #whatiread #goodreads #libbyapp

My main hold-up with this memoir was that it felt like it fell short based on the abstract. Based on the description, I went into it expecting mystery, conflict, and maybe even kidnapping or at least a little illegal activity. Instead, we get a non-linear montage of childhood memories and scattered thoughts. Eddington does have a beautiful writing style rich with imagery, but the story didn't start to really take on a plot until about 60% of the way through, which I found frustrating as a reader. Otherwise, it was a very unique life story, definitely worth telling.

Thank you NetGalley and She Writes Press for the opportunity to read an advanced reader's copy in exchange for my honest review.

I hate to mark down memoirs, because it is someone's real life story.. But this was drier than I anticipated. I did want a bit more drama (weird to say, since she was adopted with minimal information. Having a sister I found on Ancestry, I was hoping the story would be heartwarming. I feel bad for Patti, that it took this many years, and so many family members moving on. There are some answers she will never get, due to those family members that have already passed on.

3.5 stars, rounded up.

This was interesting. Definitely a read for a very particular audience. Enjoyed it as much as one can with the topic being discussed.

I enjoyed this book and all of the personal stories that took me along the author's journey. I loved the way she spoke of her family and found her to be both interesting and engaging.

The only challenge for me was that the writing style was a bit hard to get into because there was no specific flow. It did take me awhile longer than planned to get through this book, but it was worth sticking with.

Overall I appreciated the honesty and transparency in storytelling, and am thankful for the opportunity to read this story. I would recommend to someone looking for a unique memoir.

This is a beautiful memoir of Patti's life. I appreciated the complex emotions interspersed with facts of Patti's early childhood history. As an amateur genealogist, I was very excited to read how she came upon these discoveries. I wish she had gone into more detail of this process.

A well written memoir, but I found the pacing a bit too slow and the descriptions a bit too detailed. It didn't manage to fully hold my interests like memoirs usually do.

l guess I didn’t realize book was a true story. l felt like the story telling was all over the place. Too much unnecessary information was given.

Honestly, this book just wasn't my favorite. I really wanted to like it, because the author's story was so interesting, but I couldn't get into it because I did not like the style of writing.

The Girl with Three Birthdays is a memoir of a woman adopted in the 1960s. As was typical for the era, Patti's parents were not forthcoming with information about her biological origins and as an adult, she becomes curious about her past and begins investigating. The author is a straight-forward narrator and the story is well-written and compelling. My father was adopted during the same era so I enjoyed reading someone else's experience. The author decided to search for answers after spending most of her life not having much curiosity about her adoption. Many of the people she found told conflicting stories, but the author seems to have found peace within the ambiguity. Her love for her family, both biological and adopted is clear and her acceptance of her family's flaws is admirable. I would have liked to learn more about some of the stories she alluded to with her adoptive mom, but overall really enjoyed this book.

Name of Book: The Girl With Three Birthdays
Author: Patti Eddington
Publisher: She Writes Press
Genre: Memoir
Pub Date: May 7, 2024
My Rating: 3.6 rounded up
Pages: 240

The full title of this story is "The Girl with Three Birthdays: An Adopted Daughter's Memoir of Tiaras, Tough Truths, and Tall Tales."
Patti Eddington always knew she was adopted, and her parents shared what info they knew; Patti was curious and wanted more information but didn’t want to hurt her adopted parents with a search for her biological parents.
I understand this as our daughter are adopted we were given some information and were told that once the girls were 21 they legally could find out more information.
I remember when one of my daughters was young and I told her this she asked – Will you help me? I smiled and said Of Course.

Patti tells us about her Morrice, Michigan childhood in the 70’s & 80”s
In her first chapter - ‘Here’s The Thing About The Truth’.
She tells us about was fifteen she found out she had a different birth date also was told that her birth mother and four siblings lived in an unheated garage, This was reported to social services and they took Mary Ann the youngest (we learn that Patti was Mary Ann) She keeps finding more ‘truths’ that don’t line up with what she already believes to be true.
The birth day was reported on her birth certificate November 15, 1959 was wrong. She finds out that Mary Ann Ball later Patricia Ann Eddington was born April 2, 1962.Her third birthday is when her Aunt Eva is dying and decides that October 19 is good day to celebrate Patti’s birthday.
I mention this as the title is about having three birthdays However, this memoir is not only learning more about
her birth family but also she reaffirms her gratitude and love to Jim and Millie Eddington the parents who
raised her.

Want to thank NetGalley and She Writes Press for this early eGalley.
Publishing Release Date scheduled for May 7, 2024.
BTW: She Writes Pres is an independent publishing company founded to serve women writers
everywhere. Visit at ~
https://shewritespress.com/

The truth is stranger than fiction in The Girl with Three Birthdays, An Adopted Daughter's Memoir of Tiaras, Tough Truths, and Tall Tales by Patti Eddington. Patti has known she was adopted for most of her life, and to anyone who asks, she asserts she has no desire to know anything about her biological family. She has been raised by two amazing people in a loving family, and she doesn't need to know any more than that. But over the years, little things begin to add up: finding out the birthday she celebrated isn't her "real" birthday, her parents' overprotectiveness, and her mother's penchant for tall tales all lead Patti to question things. But it's not until she takes a geneology test that she begins unraveling the truth about her birth and adoption.

The premise of this book hooked me immediately. I devoured Inheritance, author Dani Shapiro's memoir about finding out her true paternity through submitting her DNA for analysis, and I figured this would be similarly engrossing. The fact Patti knew she was adopted, and seeing the Report of Investigation of the adoption would be included also piqued my interest.

The Girl with Three Birthdays delivers on its premise: we do, in fact, learn about Patti's three birthdays. As a journalist, Patti does a great job of leaving enticing breadcrumbs at the ends of chapters to spur you on to the next page. When Eddington relates the stories and incidents that didn't add up, or describes meeting and attempting to connect with her biological relatives, the prose is engaging and feels like someone telling you their story face to face. I really enjoyed those moments.

There are some sections where the book seemed to drag, but Eddington weaves them into the story later in ways that made me grateful those seemingly unnecessary details were already in place. The latter section of the book was a treasure trove of moments where she refers back to those moments in ways that made me happy I'd persisted. It's hard to say these areas should be cut because the reader needs the information later in the story, but they could have been sprinkled in better.

Overall, I enjoyed reading The Girl with Three Birthdays and would recommend this book to anyone who loves personal stories about the search for identity and truth. You will especially enjoy it if you're interested in the doors services like Ancestry.com have opened for those with questions about their origins. To see this sort of story rendered from a journalist's perspective is fascinating. The blending of facts and research with memories and half-truths (and, in a few instances, outright lies) make for a uniquely crafted narrative where you don't get all the answers, but, like Patti, you learn enough to be sure of the result.

The issues involved with adoption and the emotions that this can cause were very well put across. I found it amazing to realise that birth certificates could be redone when adoption takes place though. The discovery that there were 4 birthdays recorded or celebrated was mind blowing. I did have mixed feelings when reding this book as I found it confusing in places, trying to place all the names and where they fitted into the biological or adoption side of the family.
This is a book telling Patti's family all about how she found out about her biological family and how both sides formed a part of her life.

Thanks so much to NetGalley for the digital ARC.

I was disappointed in this memoir. I've read quite a few books about genealogy and adoptees and this one seemed right in my wheelhouse from the blurb, but it didn't have enough meat in it. The title is very compelling, I hadn't heard of people with that many birthdays, but the fleshing out of Patti's story didn't engage me enough. I finished it since I wanted to give a review of the entire book.

It's a nice-enough tale of a girl growing up in the 1960s in rural Michigan, but I wanted more. I was looking for a compelling story about her adoption and birth family, but this didn't hold my interest as much as I expected it to. It didn't really have enough revelations about her birth family or her adoptive parents. The writing was competent but there wasn't enough content to keep my interest throughout the book..