BiblioVault - Books about Grandparent and child

Ann Harleman

University of Texas Press

Nan and her four-year-old granddaughter Jane are taking their first airplane trip together, flying from Seattle to the East Coast. But this is no ordinary excursion. Nan is abducting Jane.

Nan's own daughter, Alex, believes Jane's father has been sexually abusing her, and she's asked Nan to take her away, to hide her. But when she and Jane arrive in Providence, Rhode Island, things begin to go wrong. The old friend whom Nan expected to stay with has vanished. Her son-in-law is on her trail. And Alex disappears.

"I'm too old for this!" Nan thinks, in furious, self-pitying despair. She wasn't a good wife; she wasn't a good mother. Now she's stranded in a strange city, without friends or money or even her own identity, in sole charge of a very unhappy little girl. When her new life offers new friends, new work, and even a new lover, she must decide whom to trust.

The Year She Disappeared explores the possibility—and the price—of late blooming love. Will the trials Nan faces during her year on the lam break her? Or will she discover who she really is?

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The Good Oak

Martin Etchart

University of Nevada Press, 2005

Thirteen-year-old Matt Echbar is angry at the world. His widowed father is too busy for him, and his grandfather is an embarrassment, an unschooled Basque shepherd whose language and customs are completely alien to Matt’s all-American lifestyle. Things get worse when the grandfather steals a flock of sheep and dragoons Matt into helping him drive them to a secret camp in the Arizona mountains. The ensuing adventure is one of the most compelling and delightful coming-of-age novels in recent fiction. As Matt and his aitatxi, accompanied by their two faithful sheepdogs, drive the flock across the burgeoning suburbs of Phoenix and into the remote mountains, the boy learns the ancient skills of the sheepherder and discovers the unexpected wisdom that has given his Old Country grandfather the strength and patience of a sturdy oak. By the time the journey reaches its fateful conclusion, Matt has developed a new bond with the old man and has learned that true manhood includes accepting one’s heritage.

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Linked Lives

Elder Care, Migration, and Kinship in Sri Lanka

Michele Ruth Gamburd

Rutgers University Press, 2021

When youth shake off their rural roots and middle-aged people migrate for economic opportunities, what happens to the grandparents left at home? Linked Lives provides readers with intimate glimpses into homes in a Sri Lankan Buddhist village, where elders wisely use their moral authority and their control over valuable property to assure that they receive both physical and spiritual care when they need it. The care work that grandparents do for grandchildren allows labor migration and contributes to the overall well-being of the extended family. The book considers the efforts migrant workers make to build and buy houses and the ways those rooms and walls constrain social activities. It outlines the strategies elders employ to age in place, and the alternatives they face in local old folks’ homes. Based on ethnographic work done over a decade, Michele Gamburd shows how elders face the challenges of a rapidly globalizing world.

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You've Always Been There for Me

Understanding the Lives of Grandchildren Raised by Grandparents

Dunifon, Rachel E

Rutgers University Press, 2018

Today, approximately 1.6 million American children live in what social scientists call “grandfamilies”—households in which children are being raised by their grandparents. In You’ve Always Been There for Me, Rachel Dunifon uses data gathered from grandfamilies in New York to analyze their unique strengths and distinct needs. Though grandfamilies can benefit from the accumulated wisdom of mature adults raising children for a second time, Dunifon notes, such families also face high rates of health problems as well as parenting challenges related to a large generation gap. Grandfamilies are also largely hidden in American society, flying under the radar of social service agencies, policymakers, and family researchers. This book gives family researchers a greater understanding of a unique family form, and also offers service providers, policymakers and the general public important information about the lives of an important group of American families.

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