American Bastard

BASED ON TRUE STORIES ABOUT ADOPTION: Beatty’s memoir deconstructs what it means to be a chosen baby in Western culture AN HONEST TAKE ON FAMILY: American Bastard is a frank observation of adoption, living in an orphanage, and the struggle to find comfort in one’s birth parents versus adopted parents. SEARCHING FOR ONE’S IDENTITY: What happens when adoption means complete erasure of selfhood? FROM CANADA TO UNITED STATES: Beatty searches for her Canadian father, a three-time Stanley Cups-winning hockey player, and her working-class birth mother from Pittsburgh.