Pieces of Me: Rescuing My Kidnapped Daughters

by Lizbeth Meredith

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Author: Lizbeth Meredith

Publisher: She Writes Press

Paperback:
ISBN 10: 1631528343
ISBN 13: 978-1631528347

In 1994, Lizbeth Meredith said good-bye to her four- and six year-old daughters for a visit with their non-custodial father only to learn days later that they had been kidnapped and taken to their father's home country of Greece.

Twenty-nine and just on the verge of making her dreams of financial independence for her and her daughters come true, Lizbeth now faced a $100,000 problem on a $10 an hour budget. For the next two years fueled by memories of her own childhood kidnapping Lizbeth traded in her small life for a life more public, traveling to the White House and Greece, and becoming a local media sensation in order to garner interest in her efforts. The generous community of Anchorage becomes Lizbeth's makeshift family one that is replicated by a growing number of Greeks and expats overseas who help Lizbeth navigate the turbulent path leading back to her daughters.

Review

2018 Readers' Favorites Book Awards Silver Medal in Non-Fiction―Memoir

2018 Beverly Hills Book Awards in Family and Parenting

2017 Silver Medalist, IPPY in Memoir/Personal Struggles

2017 International Book Awards, Finalist Autbiography/Memoir

2016 Best Book Awards, Finalist Women's Issues

"Pieces of Me is an important, honest, and heart-rending story of a brave young mother's struggle to save her precious daughters, no matter the toll it takes on her, as she through it all carries the double burden of reliving her own childhood trauma."

—Lene Fogelberg, author of The Wall Street Journal bestseller Beautiful Affliction

"Lizbeth Meredith writes hauntingly about an all too common experience - domestic violence - and its ultimate aftermath: kidnapping. In the face of a mother's nightmare she summons all her resources to recover her daughters. Pieces of Me is powerful testimony to one woman's courage and resilience in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds, and to the unbreakable bonds between a mother and her daughters."

—Eleanor Vincent, author of Swimming with Maya: A Mother's Story

"Pieces of Me is the inspiring tale of how a quietly powerful woman overcame bullying, abduction, arrest and being failed by the authorities in two continents to free her daughters."

—Dr. Jane Wilson-Howarth, author of A Glimpse of Eternal Snows

"In mid-March 1994, Meredith writes, her former spouse kidnapped their two young daughters from Alaska and took them to his native country of Greece. Over the next two years, she tried to locate the girls and bring them back to her Alaska home, all while navigating a bureaucratic and legal labyrinth in a foreign culture. This book is a remarkably eloquent and harrowing account of a journey that would tax any parent. The book's conclusion could hardly be a more resounding tribute to the human spirit. A unique perspective on a harrowing Greek odyssey."

—Kirkus Reviews

"One of the many strengths of her trenchant pilgrimage to rescue her children is that it does not devolve into a cloying composite of artificially constructed set pieces, designed to squeeze our tear ducts dry. Meredith gracefully pulls us in to her journey so that we?re traveling into Greece with her, by her side, silent participants, holding on as best we can, much like she is doing. Her recounting of this painful episode remains a taut thriller, a twisting rollercoaster ride up and down the gamut of emotions."

—Anchorage Press

"Pieces of Me is a well-written yet plain-spoken book about complex events. Primarily told in the present tense, it can be raw, pulling no punches and putting you in Lizbeth Meredith’s predicament… The support she receives from much of her community and from Greek people themselves offsets the anguish of not knowing what her daughters are experiencing, part of which is their transformation into little Greek girls. Pieces of Me is a triumph not only for Meredith, but for any parent faced with the sudden, brutal kidnapping of their children.

—Reader's Favorite

About the Author

Lizbeth Meredith is a writer with a bachelor's degree in journalism and a master's degree in psychology. She has worked as a domestic violence advocate and a child abuse investigator, and with at-risk teens as a juvenile probation supervisor. She blogs at www.lameredith.com, is a contributor to A Girls' Guide To Travelling Alone by Gemma Thompson, and is the author of When Push Comes to Shove: How to Help When Someone You Love Is Being Abused. She lives in Anchorage, Alaska near her two adult daughters.