Finding Gloria

Book excerpt: Author Marianne Curtis reveals her own personal, heart-wrenching, and, ultimately, inspiring story in Finding Gloria. Her past is laid bare in achingly honest detail, and her willingness to share her story with resonate with readers everywhere.Pouring her own hardships out onto the page, Marianne Curtis recounts her experiences growing up as an adopted child: adopted at birth, she was raised in a household where she was subjected to terrible and heart breaking forms of abuse. Her adoptive mother repeatedly tried to break her spirit, insisting that she was worthless and unwanted. In a desperate attempt to escape her circumstance, Curtis fled, as a teenager, to another city.Desperate for acceptance and love, she married at age eighteen, and, by twenty-four, had four children. Her insecurities from her traumatic childhood followed her, however, and eventually led to the dissolution of three marriages and her own mental breakdown.Finally, after the death of her adoptive mother, Curtis searched out her birth family, found them through Facebook, and eventually came to a place of love, healing, peace, and acceptance through the family she had not known for more than four decades.An inspiring story about rising from the ashes of our pasts, Marianne Curtis' memoir is written in a pure, vivid voice, and draws readers in with her will to survive despite the seemingly insurmountable struggles that she faced. Finding Gloria is one woman's incredible story of love, loss, redemption, and forgiveness, even in the face of devastating events. A beautiful and moving tale, Curtis' raw emotion and fragile hope is revealed through her candid prose and unbreakable spirit.