Waking From
Innocent Dreams

On the verge of adulthood, an adoptee is contacted by a human rights organization with news that changes everything he thought he knew about himself. Growing up, Nelson lived in a family that loved him but looked nothing like him. He has spent years longing to meet the one person he believes will make him whole.

A positive DNA test reveals him to be Roberto, the son of revolutionaries who, as an infant, was desaparecido, disappeared, along with his mother, during a violent government raid.

After a tearful reunion, Nelson/Roberto realizes he has been given something almost no other desaparecido receives: a chance to discover a life stolen from him. As one of the few ever reunited with their origins, he sets out on an epic adventure to find the belonging and identity he has yearned for his entire life.

His journey takes him to the city streets, volcanic hilltops, and rural countryside of Central America, where he must learn to navigate two distinct fathers, families, and cultures.

But when his father’s rigid, black-and-white worldview threatens to shatter the family unity Nelson has dreamed of since childhood, he faces an impossible choice. He must learn to embrace the painful truths his ghost has been trying to show him before his fantasies leave him lost between worlds, ni de aquí ni de allá.

My name is Nelson de Witt, but it’s also Roberto Coto. I am one of El Salvador’s Disappeared Children, kids who were separated from their families during the country’s 13-year-long civil war.

I am currently seeking representation for my novel, which is 115,000-words in its current draft. If you are a literary agent who is interested in taking a look at my project, please get in touch, and I would be happy to forward a sample of any length.

Since the 1950s, governments throughout Central and South America have abducted more than 100,000 people as a strategy of intimidation and control. While most are presumed dead, a small subset, almost entirely children, have survived and had their origins concealed.

As someone who was forcibly disappeared and had a family member who was disappeared, I am able to write about this phenomenon from a unique perspective. Not only do I understand the ambiguous grief that comes from having a loved one taken this way, but I’ve also had to wrestle with complex issues such as identity confusion, family separation, and cultural bifurcation that affect many Latinx, Central American, and other marginalized communities.

In addition to this book, I am working on a documentary film called Identifying Nelson/Buscando a Roberto. It centers around a week-long trip I took to El Salvador in 2011, where I got to connect with the other Disappeared Children, interview members of my birth family, and meet the country’s president.

My work and story have been featured on The BBC World Service, The NACLA Report, The Christian Science Monitor, The Los Angels Times and The Huffington Post. Besides appearing on several podcasts, I’ve also spoken about my story at a number of high schools and colleges, including Dartmouth College, Yale University, Wellesley College, and University of Chicago.

After much consideration I’ve decided to pursue traditional publishing. This can be a lengthy process so it could be months or years before my book is released.

If you are interested in purchasing a copy when it is available you should sign up for my newsletter, and I will notify you when it is ready.

With my manuscript done, most of the hard work of writing and editing is behind me. However, now begins the potentially even harder work of getting my book into the world. Each year hundreds of thousands of books are published. Most of them languish in obscurity, only selling a handful of copies.

Please visit the Spread the Word page to see if there is something you can do to help me with this endeavor.