"The Juggler's Children" is the story of Carolyn Abraham’s search for her great-grandfathers. A genealogical search more difficult than most, it was only made possible through the advances of science and the cooperation of Abraham’s family. The hunt start in the early 2000’s when DNA became part of the family historian’s arsenal because the documentary records were sketchy at best. The Abraham family may live in Canada now but their links are through a mixture of races that met up in India. One great-grandfather was a ship’s captain from Jamaica and the other was a Chinese juggler.

It is a well told tale that takes in the ups and downs of the hunt. It includes tracking down illusive DNA and records in India and Jamaica as well as the soul searching that such a journey involves for all of the people involved. It was an interesting story made more so by the desire that I have to be able to follow my own research trail enhanced by the scientific evidence revealed through DNA testing.

A family’s legend of two great-grandfathers leads the author into a genealogical search spanning the globe. Using cutting edge DNA collection processes available to us all, the author discovers both her Chinese ancestry and her slave jobber ancestors in Jamaica. Like her, I have waited years for a match response from www.ysearch.org but unlike her I have yet to receive a response to my son’s haplogroup, I1a, or my mtDNA from Oxford Ancestors. This book is a feast with all the terminologies genealogists and geneticists crave. ( )

I was an avid genealogist for several years, a while ago. Many nights I'd be up until 2 am, despite having to get up for work in only 5 hours, because I'd be "on a roll". I'd be uncovering a stream of information about newly discovered ancestors, going farther and farther back. One line even got traced back to the tenth century. The key was hitting European nobility in your lines - once you found that, you were in through the door to a rich world of intricate genealogy that was often well documented.
"Brick walls", in which no further progress could be made on a particular line, became more and more common as I exhausted the on-line sources. It was the lure of the 'Eureka!' moment that propelled me. Carolyn Abraham in this book compares this to the addicting playing of slot machines. Every once in a while you are rewarded with celebratory bells and whistles and a few coins, and this encourages you to keep playing. Nothing beat the immense satisfaction of solving a mystery. In one instance, I was able to 'find' a long-lost relative who disappeared in the 1830s, never to be seen again by his family in England. The scoundrel had absconded to Canada and set up house with a new wife and family, but the link was never found until the 21st century. The descendants of his English family were gobsmacked when we made contact. They always wondered what happened to him. Sweet.
So I really get this story. Tracing the genealogy of her own family with roots in China, Jamaica, India, England...it seems to be not possible. But Abraham is a journalist with a good science background and the requisite degree of obsessiveness. It takes many many hours of patient searching through online archives, databases, old newspapers, genealogy trees to find just snippets of relevant information. Then she started to also use the information gleaned from genetic analysis of buccal swabs of family members. Genetic genealogy has become big business in the last few years. DNA analysis sometimes helps to break down the brick walls.
This was a fascinating description of how she was able to use this technology, and its pitfalls and limitations.
But she keeps the emphasis on solving the mysteries of her family tree, and muses about the ethics of genetic digging (many people think some things are best left undisturbed; 'false paternity', is said to be about 10% -- your dad may not be your dad).
A fascinating and unusual account of what it means to be a family.

( )

The usual approach to family research is through document research. However, since Ms Abraham didn't know where her grandparents came from she used DNA, and a good deal of tenacious research to uncover her family origins. ( )

3.5 stars

Carolyn Abraham was born in England, but grew up in Canada. She had brown skin and when she asked her parents where they were “from”, they had a hard time answering. As she traced back their lineage, she followed them to India, her father's roots to China, her mother's roots to Jamaica... She did this with a combination of “paper” research and DNA testing of many family members.

This was quite interesting. I will admit to falling in and out of focus at various points (and not consistent points), but overall I found it interesting. I was able to follow some of the science/DNA stuff, but lost interest at other parts. Likewise, my interest waxed and waned at various points while she was actually learning stories of her ancestors. I think I found the Jamaica section of her mother's family the most interesting. It almost makes me want to research my own family... but not quite! It's a lot of time, effort, work, and money to travel to some of these places! ( )