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vii Contents Acknowledgments ix Introduction: The Child’s Book of Parental Deception 1 1. Faith-Changing for Life 17 The Wounds of Memory: Shame and Discovery in the Kurzem Family 19 Into the Belly of the Beast: Counterfeiting Identity for Survival 33 Probing Secret Conversions: Helen Fremont’s Anguished Inquisition 43 2. Deciphering Enigma Codes 54 Shadowing the Furtive Father Beyond the Grave: Mary Gordon’s Ambivalent Inquiry 56 “Love Is No Detective”: Germaine Greer’s Guilty Hunt 65 Family on the Lam: A Son Running After Secrets 74 A Scavenger in the Archives: The “Memory Boy” Tracks His Parents 83 The Naked Lady’s Face and the Detective’s Effacement 91 3. The Men Who Were Not There 99 Sleuthing Amidst the Shards of the Past: Tracking Absence in the Austers 101 The Letters and the Flag: Recuperating a Lost Father 110 viii CONTENTS Speaking Him into the World: A Daughter Reenters Her Father’s History 119 A Father Gone Missing: Documenting a Broken Bond 128 4. Becoming One’s Parent 137 The Limits of Privacy: Decorum and Exposure at the Ackerleys 139 “Lies Like Contagious Diseases”: The Secrets of the Duke and His Son 147 Imagining Himself in the Paternal Matrix 155 Shared Secrets in the Fun House 161 5. Breaking the Silence 174 Race, Secrecy, and Discovery: Black on White, White on Black 176 Conclusion: Freedom or Exploitation? 186 Bibliography 189 Index 195 ...

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