# A Good Likeness

Canonical: https://www.bookquiver.com/paul-arnott/a-good-likeness/9780349121024

![A Good Likeness](https://quivercdn.com/covers/abacus/paul-arnott/a-good-likeness_978-03-4912-102-4.jpg?v=2026-08-07%2003%3A41%3A17)

- Book: [A Good Likeness](https://www.bookquiver.com/paul-arnott/a-good-likeness) ([A Good Likeness.md](https://www.bookquiver.com/paul-arnott/a-good-likeness.md))
- Authors: [Paul Arnott](https://www.bookquiver.com/paul-arnott)
- Publisher: abacus
- ISBN: 978-03-4912-102-4
- Pages: 1
- Published: 2010-04-22
- Language: en_GB
- Binding: Softcover

## Description

Paul Arnott has two very early memories. One is as a two-year-old having a bath in a hotel sink in Tenby; the other, a Bromley afternoon, when Mr and Mrs Arnott told Paul that 'his real Mummy and Daddy couldn't keep him' - & that they had adopted him. Then, for 30 years, he barely gave his adoption a moment's thought - until the observation of the likeness between his son & himself provoked a quest to find his own biological parents ... What he discovered was a near-complete family in Ireland - his parents had later married & had four other children, lighting a candle in his name every day for 33 years. A GOOD LIKENESS weaves historical, political, religious & psychological thought into a personal narrative of the hopes, 'what-ifs' & discoveries of the author's quest. He talks to those of his parent's generation who did not yield to the pressure to abandon the illegitimate & to the children with very different stories to tell, as well as priests & politicians, newfound families & the supportive or unreconciled adoptive relatives.