Bestselling author Mitch Albom returns to nonfiction for the first time in more than a decade in this poignant memoir that celebrates Chika, a young Haitian orphan whose short life would forever change his heart.

Chika Jeune was born three days before the devastating earthquake that decimated Haiti
in 2010. She spent her infancy in a landscape of extreme poverty, and when her mother
died giving birth to a baby brother, Chika was brought to The Have Faith Haiti Orphanage
that Albom operates in Port Au Prince.

With no children of their own, the forty-plus children who live, play, and go to school at
the orphanage have become family to Mitch and his wife, Janine. Chika's arrival makes a
quick impression. Brave and self-assured, even as a three-year-old, she delights the
other kids and teachers. But at age five, Chika is suddenly diagnosed with something a
doctor there says, “No one in Haiti can help you with.”

Mitch and Janine bring Chika to Detroit, hopeful that American medical care can soon
return her to her homeland. Instead, Chika becomes a permanent part of their household,
and their lives, as they embark on a two-year, around-the-world journey to find a cure.
As Chika's boundless optimism and humor teach Mitch the joys of caring for a child, he
learns that a relationship built on love, no matter what blows it takes, can never be lost.
Told in hindsight, and through illuminating conversations with Chika herself, this is Albom
at his most poignant and vulnerable. Chika is a celebration of a girl, her adoptive
guardians, and the incredible bond they formed-a devastatingly beautiful portrait of what
it means to be a family, regardless of how it is made.

Author Biography

Mitch Albom is an internationally bestselling author, screenwriter, playwright, and award-
winning journalist. He is the author of six consecutive number one New York Times

bestsellers and has sold over thirty-five million copies of his books in forty-five languages
worldwide, including Tuesdays with Morrie, which is the bestselling memoir of all time.
Albom also works as a columnist and broadcaster and has founded eight charities in
Detroit and Haiti, where he operates an orphanage. He lives with his wife, Janine, in
Michigan.