Just Like Us
The True Story of Four Mexican Girls Coming of Age in America
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Narrated by:
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Paula Christensen
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By:
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Helen Thorpe
About this listen
Just Like Us tells the story of four high-school students whose parents entered this country illegally from Mexico. All four of the girls have grown up in the United States, and all four want to live the American dream, but only two have documents. As the girls attempt to make it into college, they discover that only the legal pair see a clear path forward.
A coming-of-age story about girlhood and friendship, as well as the resilience required to transcend poverty, Just Like Us is also a book about identity. The girls, their families, and the critics who object to their presence allow the reader to watch one of the most complicated social issues of our times unfurl in a major American city.
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- One Mayor's Challenge and a Model for America's Future
- By: Pete Buttigieg
- Narrated by: Pete Buttigieg
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Once described by The Washington Post as "the most interesting mayor you've never heard of", Pete Buttigieg, the 36-year-old Democratic mayor of South Bend, Indiana, has improbably emerged as one of the nation's most visionary politicians. First elected in 2011, Buttigieg left a successful business career to move back to his hometown, previously tagged by Newsweek as a "dying city", and transformed it into a shining model of urban reinvention.
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Reveals a Person Wise & Experienced & Literate
- By dbbks3 on 03-17-19
By: Pete Buttigieg
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Born Bright
- A Young Girl's Journey from Nothing to Something in America
- By: C. Nicole Mason
- Narrated by: Robin Eller
- Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Born Bright, C. Nicole Mason's powerful memoir, is a story of reconciliation, constrained choices, and life on the other side of the tracks. Born in the 1970s in Los Angeles, California, Mason was raised by a beautiful but volatile 16-year-old single mother. Early on, she learned to navigate between an unpredictable home life and school, where she excelled. By high school, Mason was seamlessly straddling two worlds.
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Solid Book
- By Daryl on 11-06-16
By: C. Nicole Mason
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First
- Sandra Day O'Connor
- By: Evan Thomas
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 16 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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She was born in 1930 in El Paso and grew up on a cattle ranch in Arizona. At a time when women were expected to be homemakers, she set her sights on Stanford University. When she graduated near the top of her law school class in 1952, no firm would even interview her. But Sandra Day O’Connor’s story is that of a woman who repeatedly shattered glass ceilings - doing so with a blend of grace, wisdom, humor, understatement, and cowgirl toughness.
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Remarkable woman, well served in this book.
- By KathrynVB on 04-05-19
By: Evan Thomas
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Strange Stones
- By: Peter Hessler
- Narrated by: George Backman
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Full of unforgettable figures and an unrelenting spirit of adventure, Strange Stones is a far-ranging, thought-provoking collection of Peter Hessler’s best reportage - a dazzling display of the powerful storytelling, shrewd cultural insight, and warm sense of humor that are the trademarks of his work. Over the last decade, as a staff writer for The New Yorker and the author of three books, Peter Hessler has lived in Asia and the United States, writing as both native and knowledgeable outsider in these two very different regions.
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funny, entertaining
- By Katherine on 08-02-13
By: Peter Hessler
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In the Country We Love
- My Family Divided
- By: Diane Guerrero, Michelle Burford
- Narrated by: Diane Guerrero
- Length: 9 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Diane Guerrero, the television actress from the megahit Orange Is the New Black and Jane the Virgin, was just 14 years old on the day her parents were detained and deported while she was at school. Born in the US, Guerrero was able to remain in the country and continue her education, depending on the kindness of family friends who took her in and helped her build a life and a successful acting career for herself, without the support system of her family.
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Moves very slowly
- By Laura S. on 07-23-16
By: Diane Guerrero, and others
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When Everything Changed
- The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present
- By: Gail Collins
- Narrated by: Christina Moore
- Length: 15 hrs
- Unabridged
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An enthralling blend of oral history and Gail Collins' keen research, this definitive look at 50 years of feminist progress shimmers with the amusing, down-to-earth liberal tone that is this New York Times columnist's trademark.
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The book I have been waiting for!
- By A Teacher on 09-10-10
By: Gail Collins
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High-Risers
- Cabrini-Green and the Fate of American Public Housing
- By: Ben Austen
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 13 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Built in the 1940s atop an infamous Italian slum, Cabrini-Green grew to 23 towers and a population of 20,000 - all of it packed onto just 70 acres a few blocks from Chicago's ritzy Gold Coast. Cabrini-Green became synonymous with crime, squalor, and the failure of government. For the many who lived there, it was also a much-needed resource - it was home. By 2011, every high-rise had been razed, the island of black poverty engulfed by the white affluence around it, the families dispersed.
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Little mention of accountability of the people getting the housing
- By Steve D Renz on 05-15-18
By: Ben Austen
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Excellent Daughters
- The Secret Lives of Young Women Who Are Transforming the Arab World
- By: Katherine Zoepf
- Narrated by: Katherine Zoepf
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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For more than a decade, Katherine Zoepf has lived in or traveled throughout the Arab world, reporting on the lives of women, whose role in the region has never been more in flux. Only a generation ago, female adolescence as we know it in the West did not exist in the Middle East. There were only children and married women. Today, young Arab women outnumber men in universities, and a few are beginning to face down religious and social tradition in order to live independently, to delay marriage, and to pursue professional goals.
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Best book on Middle East written this decade
- By Zuzana B on 07-02-17
By: Katherine Zoepf
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Bluegrass
- A True Story of Murder in Kentucky
- By: William Van Meter
- Narrated by: Ed Sala
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Widely published journalist William Van Meter returned to his hometown of Bowling Green, Kentucky to research this harrowing account of a horrifying crime that occurred at Western Kentucky University. In 2003, attractive college student Katie Autry was found dead in her dorm room after being raped, stabbed, and set on fire. As Van Meter delves into the facts of the case, further disturbing information surfaces.
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Excellent!
- By brooke whitehead on 01-09-23
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Not Afraid of Life
- My Journey So Far
- By: Bristol Palin, Nancy French
- Narrated by: Bristol Palin
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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In this personal memoir, Bristol Palin opens up for the first time ever. She takes listeners behind the scenes, from growing up in Alaska to coming of age amid the media and political frenzy surrounding her mother's political rise; from becoming a single mother while still a teenager to coping as her relationship with the baby's father crumbled publicly. Through all of these ups and downs, Bristol learned how to face her challenges head-on, with courage and grace.
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Forgiveness
- By Dennis on 01-16-16
By: Bristol Palin, and others
What listeners say about Just Like Us
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Janelle
- 03-01-17
It is ok
jumped around a bit because I lost interest at times. but a very good and relevant story.
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- Daryl
- 10-28-14
Timely, poignant biography
Would you consider the audio edition of Just Like Us to be better than the print version?
Probably. I don't know what audiobook another reviewer read, but I thoroughly loved this narration. Paula Christensen did a fantastic job with her characters, and thoroughly owned this personal book. Her pronunciation was wonderful, and the only weak spot was her dialogue portions, which were difficult to differentiate between the characters at points.
Who was your favorite character and why?
I would have to say Clara or Yadira - good girls, bookish, who (in Yadira's case) keep themselves squirreled away and not letting others get too close. I found them complex and likable.
Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?
There were many that moved me. I found myself asking many questions during the course of this book, not many of which have answers that will assist the girls in this book, and those like them - children who, through no fault of their own, are in the USA or Canada illegally - or the countries that struggle to find a place for them.
Any additional comments?
Fantastic and timely book. It was timely in 2009 when it was first published, and it is timely now, when we have people coming from war or poverty from Mexico, Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Nigeria, and many other countries.
Terrific!
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Overall
- Jonathan Forrest
- 02-12-19
A timely exploration of the immigration debate
Thorpe embedded with these four girls and captured the messy, often hilarious and sometimes tragic lives of people affected by the confusing and contradictory laws, policies, practices and emotions around the questions of who "deserves" to be an American.
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- EmmaZ
- 01-14-20
Important topic, drawn out execution
This topic is, of course, now at least as important as then, but I feel a more streamlined presentation could help to bring it to a broader readership.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Olimpia A.
- 03-21-19
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A small glimpse into the world of geowing up with two identities at odds with eachother. Greatly enjoyed reading about a life not to far off from my own .
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- Javier E. King
- 09-18-19
Powerful
This story is one all should read. . This is an eye-opening account of four girls as they journey through high school and college. While also struggling with growing up in America as Mexicans and citizizenship differences.
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- PurpleSage
- 03-22-14
I wanted to listen but...
What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?
If I could bear the narrator I could have heard the story.
What was one of the most memorable moments of Just Like Us?
The realization that I couldn't listen to it one more moment.
How could the performance have been better?
A different narrator.
What character would you cut from Just Like Us?
The author.
Any additional comments?
Unfortunately, since Amazon took over Audible, the reviews don't reflect the audio experience, the reviews are mostly about "reading" experiences. This was a book group choice. I wanted to listen it, very much, but the narrator was so awful that I couldn't.
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4 people found this helpful