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by: Marjolijn HofTranslated by Johanna H. Prins and Johanna W. Prins

ISBN: 9781554980796 | 1554980798

No one in Fay's family looks like anyone else, because Fay and his sister, Bing, were adopted. Fay only knows that his birth mother escaped the war in Bosnia, and that he arrived in his new home with nothing more than a squeaky toy and a few clothes. But when Fay meets Maud, the new girl in town, she's curious about his birth mother and about what it's like to be adopted. And on top of that, she says smack in the middle of the street that she likes him. Suddenly Fay is full of questions — mother questions and Maud questio... MOREns. Who is his birth mother, or mother number zero, as he calls her? Why did she give him away? Is it bad to want to find her? And what should he do about Maud? Could he be in love without realizing it? With his parents' help, Fay begins to look for mother number zero, and as the search unfolds, he finds some surprising answers to his questions. Award-winning author Marjolijn Hof's gift for telling a story from a child's perspective has created a bittersweet rendering of what it's like to be adopted, and to feel the first stirrings of love.

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Fay was adopted when he was a baby. He knows only that his birth mother escaped the war in Bosnia and that he arrived in his new home with nothing more than a squeaky toy and a few clothes. His older sister Bing was adopted too, from China, where she was found abandoned on the street.When Fay's friend Maud discovers he is adopted, she urges him to search for his birth mother, but this creates mayhem at home, since there is no possibility of Bing ever being able to find her birth mother. Gradually Fay's complicated feelings about searching for his mother and his ambivalent feelings for Maud unfold. Hof's insight into human nature results in a truthful, sometimes funny, sometimes painful rendering of family life and the challenges of being adopted.

Marjolijn Hof (www.marjolijnhof.nl), formerly a children’s librarian, always dreamed of being a writer. When her first novel, Against the Odds (Een kleine kans), was published it met with high critical acclaim, winning three major Dutch and Flemish children’s book prizes — the Golden Owl Juvenile Literature Prize, the Golden Owl Young Reader’s Prize and the Golden Slate Pencil. It was also nominated for the Deutscher Jugendliteraturpreis (German Youth Literature Award) and has been translated into twelve languages. Hof has written picture books and several other novels.Johanna H. Prins and Johanna W. Prins are a daughter-mother team who have translated many books together, including Against the Odds and Mother Number Zero, both by Marjolijn Hof.