This may well be the book that introduces many physicians and social workers to the medical complexities of fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) and the moral and social issues it raises.
The Broken Cord will certainly be a valuable book for the many lay readers affected by this preventable and disabling disease. It blends the author's personal search for meaning with a scientific understanding of this globally disabling malady that has only recently been recognized and that may be reaching epidemic proportions in segments of American society.
Dorris, a Native American, splendidly recounts his successful adoption, as a single parent, of Adam, a Sioux Indian child with FAS; the process that it involved; and the slowly opening door of realization that all was not well with his son. It reveals how the protective denial of a parent's love can obscure even the insight of a professional anthropologist. It is also an