The Birthparents

"“Emotionally intense...Santo’s story embraces human nature in all its ugliness.” — Booklist “The Birthparents is the most moving novel about the disconnects within American class and culture, about love, poverty, race, and about the twisted embraces of human need, that I've read in years. Sometimes you read a book that renews your faith in the power of literature. The Birthparents is one of those books, a novel that heals as it hurts and in the healing hurts yet again. It makes you want to weep for the human condition. It's rare that a great prose stylist is also a master storyteller and an accurate reporter; Frank Santo is such a writer, and The Birthparents demonstrates that multi-talent. There's a line in the book that captures the portent of its message: ‘I wasn’t any kind of savior, white or otherwise: I was a ferry captain on the River Styx.’ If there's a better novel about New York I haven't run across it. The Birthparents is also very timely. I believe it will be remembered as one of the great novels of the first quarter of the 21st century.” — Ernest Hebert, author of The Darby Chronicles and The Old American “This book broke my heart, made me laugh, built me up, and broke it once more. A read I’ll remember for quite some time, and characters I don’t think I’ll ever forget.” — Andrew Boryga, author of Victim ""The Birthparents by Frank Santo is a must-read. Beautifully written, it swings from humor to pathos and draws us into the gripping story of a young man outside his comfort zone in the world of the Bronx’s child welfare system. The characters are so real you can see them—you know them—full of contradictions as they all struggle with the life they’ve been given to happy, and not-so-happy, endings. Go out and buy it now—you won’t be sorry."" — B.A. Shapiro, bestselling author of Metropolis, The Collector's Apprentice, and The Muralist"