""What is it like to find out you are not who you thought you were?" asks Barbara Kessel in this volume, based on interviews with over 160 people who were raised as non-Jews only to learn later on that they are of Jewish descent.". "Kessel's subjects discuss the trauma of refashioning their self-image and, for many, coming to terms with deliberate deception on the part of parents and other family. In Poland and other areas of eastern Europe, for instance, many Jews adopted by Gentiles as infants to save them from the Holocaust are only now learning of their heritage through the deathbed confessions of their adoptive parents.". "For many, the discovery of Jewish roots confirms long-held suspicions or even, in some cases, a deep attraction toward Judaism. Crypto-Jews in the southwestern United States (descendants of Jews who fled the Spanish Inquisition) find clues to their heritage in certain practices and traditions handed down through the generations - rituals that remained mysterious until their Jewish origins came to light."--BOOK JACKET.