In her first novel, The Bean Trees (1988), King-solver chronicles the beginning of the relationship between Taylor Greer and her adopted Cherokee daughter Turtle. Their story continues in the sequel, Pigs in Heaven.

Kingsolver's Homeland and Other Stories, published in 1989, contains twelve short stories focusing on various characters who struggle "to form and maintain meaningful relationships.

The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction (1999), by Linda Gordon, narrates the harrowing real-life story of the abduction and relocation of forty Irish orphans by Catholic nuns, and their subsequent adoption by Mexican American families in Arizona.

Jacquelyn Mitchard's best-selling novel, The Deep End of the Ocean, was published in 1996. It focuses on the devastating consequences suffered by a family after the disappearance of a three-year-old child.