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All You Can Ever Know: A Memoir Paperback – October 15, 2019

by Nicole Chung (Author)

4.2 2,352 ratings

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A NATIONAL BESTSELLER

This beloved memoir "is an extraordinary, honest, nuanced and compassionate look at adoption, race in America and families in general" (Jasmine Guillory, Code Switch, NPR)

What does it means to lose your roots—within your culture, within your family—and what happens when you find them?

Nicole Chung was born severely premature, placed for adoption by her Korean parents, and raised by a white family in a sheltered Oregon town. From childhood, she heard the story of her adoption as a comforting, prepackaged myth. She believed that her biological parents had made the ultimate sacrifice in the hope of giving her a better life, that forever feeling slightly out of place was her fate as a transracial adoptee. But as Nicole grew up—facing prejudice her adoptive family couldn’t see, finding her identity as an Asian American and as a writer, becoming ever more curious about where she came from—she wondered if the story she’d been told was the whole truth.

With warmth, candor, and startling insight, Nicole Chung tells of her search for the people who gave her up, which coincided with the birth of her own child. All You Can Ever Know is a profound, moving chronicle of surprising connections and the repercussions of unearthing painful family secrets—vital reading for anyone who has ever struggled to figure out where they belong.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography
Long-listed for the PEN Open Book Award
Finalist for the ABA Indies Choice Adult Nonfiction Book of the Year Award
A Finalist for the 2019 NAIBA Book of the Year in Nonfiction
Named a Best Book of the Year by The Washington Post, NPR, Time, The Boston Globe, and more

"[A] deeply moving and profound account of [Chung's] life as a Korean American adoptee, as she grows up and strives to understand her identity . . . All You Can Ever Know honors the grand complexity of love, family, and identity, while showing us how these things can save us and break us with devastating clarity and beauty." ―Today

"Chung’s memoir is more than a thoughtful consideration of race and heritage in America. It is the story of sisters finding each other, overcoming bureaucracy, abuse, separation, and time." ―The New Yorker

"Chung’s search for her biological roots . . . has to be one of this year’s finest books, let alone memoirs . . . Chung has literary chops to spare and they’re on full display in descriptions of her need, pain and bravery." ―The Washington Post

"The book is an extraordinary, honest, nuanced and compassionate look at adoption, race in America and families in general. It's also such an engaging read. I stayed up way too late one night reading it because the story just pulled me in. I read it months ago, and I still think about it and quote some of the lines in this book at least weekly." ―Jasmine Guillory, Code Switch, NPR

" Revisits her coming of age with a deep melancholy, favoring clarity over sentimentality . . . Chung emotionally relays her journey to becoming a writer―her path of negotiating and asserting her identity―and to learning about her birth family’s rather traumatic past. Yet her empathetic, graceful prose shines brightest when she casts her gaze elsewhere: on her adoptive parents―their warmth and their secrets, their struggle to talk about race―or on her birth sister, Cindy, who opens Chung’s eyes in adulthood, while similarly trying to find herself. Through them, Chung reveals a family story of heartbreaking truth―personal in its detail, universal in its complexity." ―Entertainment Weekly

"The honesty with which Chung grapples with this kind of racial erasure is a hallmark of her stunning debut memoir, a book that confronts enormous pain with precision, clarity, and grace . . . In addition to being deeply thoughtful and moving, the book is a fiercely compelling page-turner . . . But what shines through this beautiful book is her clear-eyed compassion for all her relations, her powerful desire for connection, her bold pursuit of her own identity, and the sheer creative energy it took to build her own family tree, to 'discover and tell another kind of story.'" ―The Boston Globe

" A landmark in the literature of adoption, and will be of enduring value to people looking for advice about raising a child of a different race." ―Marion Winik, Critical Mass: The Blog of the National Book Critics Circle Board of Directors

"A tender, unsentimental memoir . . . All You Can Ever Know has the patient pacing of a mystery and the philosophical heft of a skeptic’s undertaking." ―Newsday

"What gives All You Can Ever Know its power is the emotional honesty in every line, essential to the telling of a story so personal . . . All You Can Ever Know, sometimes painfully and always beautifully, explores what it means to be adopted, to be a different race from the family you grew up in, and to later create a family of your own." ―The Seattle Times

"Chung’s dynamic prose tackles identity and the forces that shape it . . . What Chung painstakingly unearths about her birth family is thrilling and unsettling, and her articulation of her findings averts tropish feel-good stereotypes. Here, the open wound at the heart of this exquisite narrative heals slightly skewed, exactly as it should." ―Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

"Raw, open, forthright, Chung’s personal odyssey is an intimate journey toward self-understanding and acceptance." ―The Christian Science Monitor

"This touching memoir explores issues of identity, racism, motherhood, and sisterhood with eloquence and grace. Highly recommended." ―Library Journal (starred review)

"[A] stunning memoir . . . Chung’s writing is vibrant and provocative as she explores her complicated feelings about her transracial adoption (which she 'loved and hated in equal measure') and the importance of knowing where one comes from." ―Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Highly compelling for its depiction of a woman's struggle to make peace with herself and her identity, the book offers a poignant depiction of the irreducibly complex nature of human motives and family ties. A profound, searching memoir about 'finding the courage to question what I'd always been told.'" ―Kirkus Reviews

"This book moved me to my very core. As in all her writing, Nicole Chung speaks eloquently and honestly about her own personal story, then widens her aperture to illuminate all of us. All You Can Ever Know is full of insights on race, motherhood, and family of all kinds, but what sets it apart is the compassion Chung brings to every facet of her search for identity and every person portrayed in these pages. This book should be required reading for anyone who has ever had, wanted, or found a family―which is to say, everyone." ―Celeste Ng, author of Little Fires Everywhere

“Adoption is neither an incident nor a process―it is an evergreen story of lives growing and resisting simple definitions. Chung’s All You Can Ever Know takes the grammar of adoption―nouns, verbs, and direct object―and with extraordinary integrity remakes them into a narrative about what it means to be a subject. A primary document of witness, Chung writes her memoir as a transracial adoptee with honesty, wisdom, and love. Her search and what she discovers offer us life’s meaning and purpose of the very highest order.” ―Min Jin Lee, author of Free Food for Millionaires and Pachinko

About the Author

Nicole Chung is the author of the national bestseller All You Can Ever Know. Named a Best Book of the Year by NPR, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Time, Library Journal, and many other outlets, All You Can Ever Know was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, a semifinalist for the PEN Open Book Award, an Indies Choice Honor Book, and an official Junior Library Guild selection. Chung is a contributing writer and editor at The Atlantic, and her writing has also appeared in The New York Times, The New York Times Magazine, GQ, Time, The Guardian, and Vulture, among others. In 2021, she was named to the Good Morning America AAPI Inspiration List honoring those “making Asian American history right now.”

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Catapult; Reprint edition (October 15, 2019)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 256 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1948226375
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1948226370
Lexile measure ‏ : ‎ 990L
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.31 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.51 x 0.69 x 8.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #94,071 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #60 in Adoption (Books)
- #1,077 in Women's Biographies
- #3,179 in Memoirs (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.2 2,352 ratings

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Nicole Chung

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Nicole Chung’s nationally bestselling first book, All You Can Ever Know, is being translated into several languages and was named a Best Book of the Year by over twenty outlets, including NPR, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Time, and Library Journal. All You Can Ever Know was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, a semifinalist for the PEN Open Book Award, a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection, and an Indies Choice Honor Book. Chung is currently a contributing writer at The Atlantic, and her writing has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, GQ, Slate, The Guardian, and Vulture. Her next book, A Living Remedy, will be published by Ecco/HarperCollins in April 2023.

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4.2 out of 5

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Keturah W

One of the best books on Transracial Adoption in 2018!

Reviewed in the United States on February 10, 2019

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I really enjoyed reading All You Can Ever Know. The book is split into four parts. In Part One, Chung discusses the confusion and pain she felt growing up and knowing that she was adopted. She retells the story that's been told to her over and over again as an adopted child, how her parents "chose" her to join their family. As Chung retells her birth story to readers she also makes sure to intertwine her own questions about her birth family, and her adoptive parent's biased narrative in her storytelling. Like many other adoptees, Chung has questions about her identity and ethnicity that haven't been explained or explored by her parents. Though she often wonders about her birth family, Chung is unsure about the best way to voice her curiosity in order to learn more about her heritage.

In Parts Two and Three, Chung describes searching for her birth parents, finds out that she has siblings, and focuses on her life after college. Part Four explores the catharsis that Chung feels after giving birth to her daughter, Abby and having biological connections to several family members for the first time. Since I don't want to spoil the story for all of you, I'm just giving a brief summary on some of the topics that are brought up in different parts of the book.

I really really loved reading All You Can Ever Know. While there were parts concerning parenthood and reunion that I have yet to identify with, I appreciate Chung's honest candor and her willingness to share her story. It's hard finding transracial adoptee books where the narrative is clear and concise and Chung does a wonderful job with both. I'm thankful that Chung didn't shy away from the difficulty and pain that many adoptees have around the subject of their adoptions and birth stories. While others (including adoptive parents) might see the adoption as a positive and "freeing" narrative in a family's story, adoptees don't always feel the same way. Chung's honesty throughout the book was refreshing to read. I felt like another adoptee knew how I felt and understood some of the personal turmoil that I’ve had growing as an adoptee in a way that I haven’t been able to share with anyone else.

-KW//TheAdopteeReads.com

12 people found this helpful

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Cindy Adair

Her story.

Reviewed in the United States on September 14, 2021

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This book was recommended for our book club to read. We try to read different genres, so a memoir was a good selection.

I found this story to be very interesting and important. I have an adopted grandchild, so it was eye opening to see how important it is to help her fill in the blanks as she gets older. The author did a good job of describing her internal struggle with identity and her decisions to truly discover who she is while still acknowledging and respecting her adoptive parents.

I am happy for her that she gained a true sister in her searching. I would have liked to know. Ore about her conversations with her adoptive parents while she was building these relationships with her birth family.

Another aspect that is important in this story is how underlying and unintentional racism played a part in her life. There will be much to discuss at our book club meeting! This was definitely a book worth reading.

6 people found this helpful

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Jeff Willis

Good message, okay execution

Reviewed in the United States on June 6, 2020

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Without taking anything away from the author's obviously powerful personal experience and the effort to broaden the public's awareness of one type of adoption experience, I found this memoir a little lacking. It felt overwritten and overly long, almost as if the author were trying to stretch an essay-length memoir into a book-length one. The author repeated the same points and arguments over and over again.

Overall, as someone who fully supports adoption, I wanted to like this book. Unfortunately, it was better in concept than in execution. It's not really a book that promotes adoption in general, or the experience of someone who was adopted as much as it was the author's personal journey to come to terms with her own individual adoption experience and promote her specific kind of adoption story.

5 people found this helpful

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GAD

Excellent book

Reviewed in the United States on February 26, 2024

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Even though not Korean, not Asian and not even adopted, there were many things I could relate to. As the first child, of my Hungarian/British parents to be born in America ( had 3 older ) siblings, I often felt out of place too...never learned the Hungarian language. I also have an adopted niece from China. I highly recommend this book to not only adoptees, but adoptors, or people who are thinking of adopting from other races and or cultures. Thank you for sharing, Nicole Chung.

One person found this helpful

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carilynp

This book is impossible to read without feeling the intensity of love.

Reviewed in the United States on October 7, 2018

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Nicole Chung’s impeccably told memoir ALL YOU CAN EVER KNOW is about growing up in a world where she felt she didn’t fit in. Her white parents adopted her as a premature baby, struggling for life in the NICU, born to a Korean family, and she was given one story her whole life about why she was put up for adoption. While her parents were loving and cared for her, they were not aware of what she was going through. She never met another person who looked like she did in the small town in Oregon where she grew up, was never introduced to her birth culture, never truly felt like she belonged, and suffered through years of cruel jokes about her physical appearance at the hands of other children.

It isn’t until she leaves home for college that Nicole feels free, meets other Asian Americans, and people with whom she feels a sense of belonging. Married and a soon-to-be-mother, she is ready to find out about her birth parents. The journey begins to unfold.

Nicole’s story is heartbreaking, heartwarming, enlightening, and told with such warmth, and without bitterness. It is about race, the urgent need to belong, and the importance of family. This book is impossible to read without feeling the intensity of love.

56 people found this helpful

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Lanaya G.

Amazing Adoption Memoir

Reviewed in Canada on October 29, 2019

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Amazing memoir about transracial adoptee. Both to first generation Korea immigrants and adopted by white parents, Nicole shares her story of feeling loved bit out of place as well as her search for her family of origin.

One person found this helpful

Carly

Very special

Reviewed in Germany on October 25, 2018

Verified Purchase

Very personal story, beautifully written and relatable. Wish there would be more books coming after this one. Just to see how everything goes further

Melissa Robbie

A gentle recounting of the trials of being Korean adopted and the surprises from connecting with her birth family

Reviewed in Australia on September 6, 2023

Verified Purchase

A loving family could not protect her from the isolation of being the very different one in the school playground. Brought up with no idea of ever connecting with Korean culture, it is the impending birth of her first child which pushes her to the emotional risk of contacting her birth family. She discovers the complex dysfunction that lead to her being adopted out, but is able to build new bonds. An absorbing and beautifully told story, rich in empathy for all concerned.

Amazon Customer

Poignant memoir of adoption and mixed heritage in USA

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 2, 2022

Verified Purchase

Waited well over three weeks or more for this to arrive from USA - ex library book but worth the wait... beautifully written memoir of the authors search for her identity and her birth parents. Rewarding and illuminating.

Amazon Customer

A wonderful read

Reviewed in Canada on October 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

Fascinating commentary on what it means to be family

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