How much do we real­ly know about the lives of our par­ents and the secrets lodged in their past? Judy Bolton-Fas­man­’s mem­oir, Asy­lum: A Mem­oir of Fam­i­ly Secrets, recounts the search for answers to the mys­ter­ies embed­ded in the lives of her Cuban-born moth­er, Matilde Alboukrek Bolton and her elu­sive, Yale-edu­cat­ed father, K. Harold Bolton. Judy Bolton embarks on the life-long explo­ration of her bifur­cat­ed ances­try; Judy inher­its a Sephardic, Span­ish/Ladi­no-speak­ing cul­ture from her moth­er and an Ashke­nazi, Eng­lish-only, Amer­i­can patri­o­tism from her father. Con­tact­ing for­mer asso­ciates, rel­a­tives, and friends, access­ing records through the Free­dom of Infor­ma­tion Act, trav­el­ing to Cuba to search for clues, and even recit­ing the Mourn­er’s Kad­dish for a year to gain spir­i­tu­al insight into her father, these decades-long endeav­ors do not always yield the answers Judy want­ed and some­times the answers them­selves lead her to ask new ques­tions. Read­ers will rel­ish every step and stage of Judy’s inves­ti­ga­tions and will begin to share in her obses­sion to obtain answers to the mys­ter­ies that have haunt­ed her life.