Finding Families: Adoption and "Orphan" Stories
A Notes from the Windowsill annotated bibliography by Wendy E. Betts. Copyright 2005, 2006

Searching for Shona by Margaret J. Anderson. Alfred A. Knopf, 1978. (0-394-82587-X).

It is 1939; World War II is beginning. Terrified of being sent to live with strangers in Canada, Marjorie Malcolm-Scott impulsively trades places with Shona McInnes, who is being evacuated to the country. Both girls are orphans from Edinburgh but there the resemblance ends--Marjorie is shy, timid and lonely, longing for Shona's life in an orphanage with other children, while tough and fearless Shona envies Marjorie's nice clothes and fancy home. Trading places seems the obvious thing to do.
Marjorie begins to reget her impulsive act when she realizes that taking on Shona's name does not make her Shona, able to cope bravely with the difficult and frightening times ahead. She regrets it even more when she finds she's been evacuated to the town Shona's mother came from, where Shona had planned to go to learn about her family. When Marjorie begins to discover the truth about Shona's family, she knows she must find a way to tell her. But the war is lasting far longer than anyone expected and Marjorie is not only learning about Shona and her family...she is also finding a real family of her own, and finding herself at last. A fascinating and revealing story about identity. (8 & up)