Book - Annie's Ghosts

Annie's Ghosts : A Journey into a Family Secret - by Steve Luxenberg

"Traces the author's surprise discovery that his late mother had had a sister who was sent away under mysterious circumstances and never mentioned by the family again, his efforts to research his long-lost aunt's story and whereabouts, and his struggles to understand the secrecy of her existence." (image & summary from WorldCat)

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My comments - 

As his mother is near death from emphysema, the author learns from a social worker that his mother had a sister. He decides not to ask his mother about this because of her mental state as she was dying. "Annie’s Ghosts” is Steve Luxenberg’s quest to find his mother’s sister. The author is about my age. He grew up in Detroit, the grandson of Jews who came to America from Ukraine in the early 1900s. 

I was fascinated with the author’s story of how he finds his lost aunt – and all that he discovers during that journey. Each conversation leads to another place, another person, another clue. Along the way he asks many rhetorical questions as he tries to understand his mother and her motivations. 

The author spends a great deal of time exploring and explaining Detroit’s mental health system in the 1900s. His aunt was institutionalized when she was 21 and the author’s mother was 23. He discusses prevailing attitudes about mental illness and disabilities in Ukraine and in the States. 

I enjoyed the genealogy, the search for family and stories, historical events and how they affect people's decisions, immigration and life in the States. 

We can go through childhood and adulthood and ask only superficial questions of our parents and grandparents. Do we really know what motivated them? Have we heard their stories? Did we listen and ask questions? Did they give us any clues about untold stories? 

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Here's a review of the book. Click here for goodreads.com summaries