OhMyHeart...this book should come with a pallet (not a box) of tissues.My Top 5 (in no particular order)The Take BackPeace of PaperUp By A MillionThese Broken StarsInk Drips Black Read it.

Anthologies can be difficult, but boy does this one get it right. I didn't connect with every single story, but the majority made me wish they were excerpts from longer books, which I'd call a success. Lots of perspectives on adoption that readers might not anticipate, in the best way.

This collection of short stories about adoption is outstanding. With each story written by a different author, your Want to Read list may grow exponentially (mine did.)

This was one of those anthologies I have talked about before where a publishing house (this time it was an agent) gets a couple of high profile authors to contribute stories to a themed anthology and then they fill the rest of the book with unknown, some even previously unpublished, writers. Collections like this are usually less than 50% good, and that would be okay if the publisher only charged $1.99, or even better, 99¢ for the ebook because they are basically promotional samplers. This ebook...

Carlos and the Fifteen-Year-Old Heart by Adi Alsaid was eh. I think I got what he was going for, but it just didn't click well for me. (2 stars)Strong Enough by Karen Atkins twisted the topic of adoption through a superhero storyline. So that was interesting, but I wish it'd been longer. I know it's an anthology and these are supposed to be short, but it really didn't feel like, well, enough. Also, if you took out the fact that the MC was adopted by non-supers, it would not be in this collection...

This is a case of "It's not you, it's me", because I need to stop reading anthologies. I just don't like them. I liked the theme of adoption here, and think this book will do so much, and I did like some of the stories...but I also disliked some. I would recommend this book, and think it contains some great stories and messages, but naturally all of them just weren't for me, and I'm disappointed that I didn't like it more.

I am so excited to be a part of this! Can't wait to hold it in my hands.

This is really special anthology. All of the contributors's lives have been touched by adoption in some way, and I feel that their experiences certainly came through in the stories they've created, and Eric Smith has done a tremendous job putting them all together. I'm a huge fan of anthologies, and this is one that I have really been looking forward to for a while now.There is just about every kind of story you could imagine about adoption in this collection from the beautiful and heartwarming

This was written with the intention of giving adopted kids stories of their own, which is a great idea, and I'm sure if I were adopted this might be easier to connect with. The problem is that all the stories are only around ten pages. Ten pages is just not enough to come up with a coherent plot and character development, no matter the talent of the author. At some point I decided I didn't want to keep going with this; it was clear that though many were very talented, almost none of the authors

Gripping my heart and holding it until the final page, I cried, I laughed, and stayed up late reading the many stories in this anthology. Home comes in many sizes and colors, and it’s the characters and the love they share that make the many stories of this anthology real. I have personal experience with adoption. My daughter came to me fresh out of eighth grade from a troubled home. She’s become so much a part of my life that it feels like she’s always been here. The many genres of stories in t...

A lot of strong, heatwarming stories in this adoption-centered anthology. I'm not a huge anthology person, so I gave it a 3.5 overall. Some stories were awesome, some were okay, didn't hate any of them. This anthology probably has the most authors I have ever seen in one anthology, so the stories were all pretty short, almost like flash fiction. Recommended for people who enjoy short story collections! Welcome Home Carlos and the Fifteen-Year-Old Heart by Adi Alsaid - 4 starsWell written but h...

I liked the idea behind this collection more than I liked the collection. Short stories about adoption, all of them with happy endings? Yes please. But the execution let me down a little, I feel like most of the stories were rushed and ended abruptly. It was more of a glimpse into a story, then a story itself. There’s a lot of interesting glimpses into potentially beautiful stories, making me wish there was at least a little bit more.What was absolutely enjoyable though was the abundance of diff...

Individual Thoughts On The Stories:1- Carlos and The Fifteen-Year-Old Heart by Adi Alsaid. 4/5 starsThis was one of the stories that I remember the most. Maybe it is because it was the first one I read, the first one that introduced me to the anthology, or maybe because the elements of this first short tale surprised me a lot. I don’t want to give anything about this one away, though.All I’m going to say about Adi Alsaid’s short story was that I really liked it. The narration was soothing and it...

There were 29 stories, and while three fell flat for me, and four were mediocre, the majority were pleasant reads. There were some that contained humour, some more serious than others, some pleasantly deviating from the contemporary genre, and was mainly quite the joy to read. However, I found it a bit sad that I found some mistakes in the book, such as words being misspelled. All in all, the diverse range in the way these stories have gone in was great and kept the theme of love and adoption in...

This is a collection of YA, adoption-themed, fictional short stories, capturing a variety of experiences. Most of the authors have some kind of connection to adoption themselves, which adds to the realism of the stories (even those set in speculative universes.)I heard about it on the Get Booked Podcast when someone asked for books on adoption that weren't simply instructional. This was a great pick!

3.5 starsI do have ratings for each individual story which I will add later (if I remember). Overall I enjoyed this anthology. I have no experience with any kind of adoption process but I really hope these stories can help others, who might have been through similar things, feel heard. Some of the stories are really short and I personally didn't get a lot out of a few but there are definitely some goodies in there.

I'm honored and excited to be a part of this short story collection focusing on adoption stories. The book releases September 5, 2017!

Super excited to be part of such an important anthology.

4.5 starsE-arc provided by Netgalley.Like all anthologies this was a mixed bag of ones I loved, some meh ones, and some I truly hated. But I loved more by far than I hated or even felt meh about, and even if that wasn't the case the ones I love were just so good that I still would have given this a high rating. It may just be because I'm adopted (adopted by my father) but so many of these stories actually brought tears to my eyes and just punched me in the heart. I loved that we had stories with...

A mixed bag, but there are some goodies in it. I received an ecopy of this through netgalley; however all opinions are my own.