Book Presentation - Ghost Child
Please join us for a very special presentation from author Deborah Jennings on Tuesday January 20 at 11:00 AM. Deborah will discuss the material behind her book Ghost Child, released in October 2025.
A young woman from a blue-collar background—aspiring and driven—spent over twenty years quietly wondering if the family who raised her was truly hers. At thirty-two, she confirmed the unthinkable: she is the biological daughter of another, entirely unknown family.
Her search unfolds like a page-turning mystery, leading to an astonishing discovery—her biological grandfather was a U.S. diplomat and author, photographed in the Oval Office with President Kennedy, greeting Charles Lindbergh on the tarmac, and meeting with Rosa Parks and international leaders. Her grandmother was a Cambridge-educated Mexican, who described to her an exotic heritage of haciendas and aristocracy in Mérida. Her birth mother, Katie, a Bohemian expatriate in Cuernavaca, Mexico, gave birth to her in secret and lived childless ever since.
Raised by loving parents who didn’t finish high school, she now must reconcile her upbringing with an extraordinary legacy. Ghost Child is a sweeping story of identity, belonging, and the strange, poignant bond between a daughter and the unforgettable birth mother she did not know.
You can read a review of this book here.
Deborah’s grandmother was born and raised in Mérida, a member of the deRegil and Peon families (who are still there) and lived between the family hacienda Uayalceh and house on the Paseo they called LaQuinta. As a result, much of the book focuses on Mérida. Deborah Jennings is an environmental lawyer, retired from a global law firm. She was a partner for thirty-four years and chaired the firm’s national environmental practice for twenty years. Upon retirement, she wrote this memoir about the discovery of her adoption and ensuing international search for her origins. In addition to being an adoptee, the author is the mother of adopted twins. She is a former board member of Adoptions Together, now named Paths for Families, in Washington, DC.
