Is it possible to stay hopeful — and to keep a sense of humor — while your deepest desire is threatened? When you’re falsely accused? When people you trust advise you to hide your heritage?

Melanie Herz Promecene, who faced each of those challenges while trying to adopt a child, is walking proof that the answer is yes.

In this staggeringly honest, often hilarious, always hopeful memoir, Promecene takes readers with her through the terror of 9/11 in New York, the floods of Hurricane Harvey in Houston, the winding streets of Beijing, and a beautiful day in Florence. And, of course, readers join her as she overcomes seemingly impossible obstacles of bureaucracy and biology.

Her account of heartbreaking decisions, innocent misunderstandings that threaten to have devastating results, and the quirks and joy of her own large family are compelling and ultimately heartwarming.

Along the way, she realizes that she and her husband aren’t choosing their son: He is choosing them.

You’ll never look at rainbows the same way.