The Place of Peace and Crickets

How adoption, heartache and love built a family

When journalist Tricia Booker and her husband had trouble conceiving, they followed the well-worn footsteps of couples exploring in-vitro fertilization. Two years and thousands of dollars later, they decided to have a long fulfilling life - without children.

Instead, they became immersed in the world of international adoption. Their first child, born in Vietnam, introduced them to exotic travel and a poor but loving orphanage where infants slept with their caretakers.

Then came Guatemala, a beautiful, impoverished country where Booker's two younger children lived in tiny cribs with so little human interaction that they repeatedly rubbed their heads back and forth on the mattress just to be able to feel.

In candid, raw prose, Booker tells the story of her family, including her son's diagnosis of Anxious-Attachment Disorder, the service dog she trained to help him, and her and her husband's chaotic attempts to simplify their lives in order to heal their son.