Annie's Ghosts: A Journey Into a Family Secret

Steve Luxenberg always knew his mother was an only child, just as he knew her name was Beth. He and his siblings are shocked when his mother mentions, during a routine medical history, a younger sister who was sent away. After his mother's death, Luxenberg begins to investigate the story of the sister and why his mother had kept Annie a secret all that time.

Annie's Ghosts is an absolutely fantastic book! I was so drawn into the story that I finished reading it in two days, picking it up every time my daughter took a nap. The story of the secret sister is compelling and Luxenberg is a wonderful story teller. His journalistic background is evident as he documented all his research and was clearly able to put people at ease and draw out show more their memories while influencing them as little as possible.

Luxenberg weaves his personal search for information about his aunt in with the history of mental health care in Michigan during the time when his mother and aunt were growing up. His research connects him to relatives that he didn't realize existed and reconnects him with some of his mother's childhood friends. In attempting to gain as much information as possible about his aunt's life in a large mental institution near Detroit, he faces many roadblocks including needing to gain legal authority to access the records and then finding out that many of those records had been destroyed.

Luxenberg often ponders his mother's motives for keeping her sister a secret and wonders how containing that secret for so long affected her. With most of the principal characters in the story already dead, it is likely that he will never find definitive answers to his many questions. However while this story certainly started out as a personal family quest, Luxenberg expands his scope to revealing the lives of so many like Annie who were sent away, lost and forgotten. show less

I happen to like it -- love it, actually -- when writers color their work with their personal motivations. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the no-nonsense analytical stuff as much as the next journalism geek, but I happen to be part of the crowd that thinks knowledge of the author him/herself enhances my interpretation of the analysis. I like knowing what the writer discovered; I also want to know what s/he was doing investigating that in the first place.

So, now that you know this about me, you might understand that I'd find Annie's Ghosts an excitingly rendered look at the early-mid 20th century American mental health system. The big story is about the "thousands" who were lost within our country's mental health system, but that story is show more grounded in the personal experience of the author as he discovers his family secret: the existence of an aunt, Annie, whom his mother pretended did not exist.

As Luxenberg tries to discover why Annie was committed to a mental hospital for more than three decades, he also works to understand why his mother kept her sister a secret. Part memoir, part mystery, Annie's Ghosts is exceptional because of the author's own personal journey to will his forgotten aunt to life. This book is deeply personal while also spanning decades and continents; what more could a reader ask for? show less

This is a book that I got through Early Reviewers and I'm so glad that I did. It's a non-fiction account of the author's journey to unearth his family's secrets. This begins with the startling news, found after his mother's death, that the author's mother had a sister who was disabled, mentally retarded, and mentally ill. This sister was committed to a state-run institution in her 20s. Even though they grew up together, his mother never mentioned this sister and actually went as far as creating story after story about growing up as an only child. The author goes on a journey through his mother's past to attempt to find out both about this sister, Annie, and his mother's reasons for hiding her sister.

The book ends up being about so many show more things: family history, secrets, memory, the treatment of the mentally ill, and the ethics of delving into someone's past and trying to recreate his/her motives.This book really got me to think about what I know about my family history. Is it truth or fiction or somewhere in between? We rely on family stories handed down, but how accurate are these accounts?

The author is a journalist and his writing shows it. For such a personal and emotionally charged topic, he stays relatively distant and factual. The mystery seems to unfold to the reader in the same manner as it did to him. I also appreciated that the author did not recreate conversations or scenes from the information he found. Because of that there are things we'll never know, but that is part of the point of the book and I was glad that he didn't invent the rest of the story.

Excellent book - highly recommended. show less

Annie's Ghosts was probably not a book I would have paid much attention to if I'd just run across it in a bookstore, but I was fortunate enough to be in the audience for a presentation about memoirs at the Kerrytown Book Fest in Ann Arbor where Steve Luxenberg was one of the panel members. And what he had to say was fascinating enough to me that I got in line to buy his book afterwards. I'm so glad I did. Because although Annie's Ghosts is mostly about his parents and family, Luxenberg keeps his own place in the narrative too, which gives this family "mystery" much more of a personal flavor. His investment in this highly personal and yet also universal "detective story" is very obvious from the beginning. And it's not just because he's show more a newspaperman and investigative reporter, although that most certainly made the book more polished and professional - more readable. No, it's because he inserted himself into the story as the son, as the grandson - as someone who obviously loved his parents very much, in spite of any failings they had - or secrets they kept. In a book that looks at the historical place and implications of mental hospitals and asylums in Michigan from the 19th century forward, and also at the immigrant experience and the Holocaust as it related to his research, this is perhaps most of all a loving and well-documented tribute to Luxenberg's family. It's not cleaned up or idealized; it's warts and all, including his mother's personal failures as a daughter or sister and his father's failings as a wage earner and soldier during WWII. Luxenberg lays it all out, and traces his various paths of discovery in a way that makes Annie's Ghosts seem like a tangled mystery - which I suppose it was. This guy can write "like nobody's business," as my dad used to say. I salute Steve Luxenberg for his investigative skills and for his storytelling, but most of all for his love of family. This is a book well worth your time. Make some time to read it, because once you start it, you won't want to put it down. - Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER. show less

When I finished Annie's Ghosts, Steven Luxenberg's memoir/investigative piece about his mother's secret sister, I had tears in my eyes. After his mother's death, Luxenberg discovers that his mother, who had always said she was an only child, had a secret, disabled and mentally ill sister who lived for years in an asylum, with few visitors and no hope of ever returning home. Not content to merely uncover the secret, Luxenberg wants to know why- why Annie was institutionalized, why his mother kept her a secret, why other family members handled Annie's situation the way they did, and what other secrets ultimately lay dormant in the family. At the end, Luxenberg has covered topics as diverse as the history of the Michigan mental health show more system, attitudes towards the disabled and mentally ill over the years, the Holocaust, the Depression, and more. Throughout the focus remains tight on "the secret"- Annie's life and death- and Luxenberg's determination to find out all he can while the remaining witnesses are still alive to testify. I found Annie's Ghosts to be a riveting, and often painful page-turner, ultimately about a son's love for his mother and family. A fascinating and compelling read.

You can see my full review at my blog here: http://www.bostonbibliophile.com/2009/06/review-annies-ghosts-journey-into.html show less

How would you react if you found out that you had relative that had been kept secret for decades? This is the unfathomable position in which Mr. Luxenberg finds himself shortly before his mother's death. His journey begins with his wrestling with the decision of what to do with the information - whether to confront his mother or leave it along - to deciding whether to dig a little further to find out who this missing aunt is and why she was kept a secret in the first place.

Mr. Luxenberg's research takes him across the nation and even to Europe as he attempts to discover Annie and understand why his mother chose to keep her sister a secret. Throughout the novel, his personal struggles to approach the topic as an impartial journalist show more versus a very eager and confused son shine through. His journalistic background will not let him rest until he uncovers as much as he can, while his duty to his family and to his late mother make him tread with caution for fear of uncovering too many secrets. To me, this struggle is what makes this an incredibly poignant and compelling novel.

I first found out about this book from Book Blogs and was instantly intrigued. As much as there are times where I might not particularly care for my family members, they are still family. I can't imagine pretending to the world that they don't exist, let alone keep the secret for decades. Added to this intrigue is a history lesson on early mental health treatments and institutionalization, as well as a foray into the Holocaust. The subject matter is fascinating. Mr. Luxenberg does a tremendous job explaining how things used to be in the field of mental health while not making excuses for treatments or opinions that would be vilified today. He also succeeds in understanding Beth Luxenberg's reasons for keeping Annie hidden from the world. We may not agree with it, but at least we, as readers, can understand why.

One other item that continued to amaze me while reading was the depths of research Mr. Luxenberg accomplished. He was able to essentially go back in time to understand public opinion, politics, and even the family and personal drama that was occurring at the time key decisions were made about Annie's future. Upon reflection, I had to ask myself if any family secret was worth the time, money and effort he devoted to discovering Annie. In the end, I realized that this is more than finding Annie and understanding his mother, Annie's Ghosts is a love story. It is a love story between a man and his family. As he immortalizes their triumphs and struggles, the good and the bad, he is doing so because he is proud to call them mother and father, grandmother and grandfather. For Mr. Luxenberg, it wasn't a matter of discovering Annie but discovering his family and sharing them with the world.

I thought this was a fascinating read and have already recommended it to others. Thanks to Julie Harabedian at FSB Associates for giving me the opportunity to read and review this novel! show less

A book I never would have found if I didn't see it on Glade1's wishlist and order it to read first. Excellent story of Annie - the disabled institutionalized sister, who Mom kept as a secret from almost everyone. I took a lot of digging for her son to find out why Annie was a secret and what happened to her. He also did a great job of outlining the state of mental institutions in the 1940's-1960's, how mental illness what treated, etc. I grew up with Byberry - a large mental institution in Pa - near my home. I had no idea about how they were run, and the 1970's turn around to get people out of them.