Such a Pretty Girl
A Story of Struggle, Empowerment, and Disability Pride
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Narrated by:
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Jennifer Jill Araya
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By:
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Nadina LaSpina
About this listen
This is Nadina LaSpina's story - from her early years in her native Sicily, where she contracts polio as a baby, a fact that makes her the object of well-meaning pity and the target of messages of hopelessness, to her adolescence and youth in America, spent almost entirely in hospitals where she is tortured in the quest for a cure and made to feel that her body no longer belongs to her, and to her rebellion and her activism in the disability-rights movement.
LaSpina's personal growth parallels the movement's political development - from coming together, organizing, and fighting against exclusion from public and social life to the forging of a common identity, the blossoming of disability arts and culture, and the embracing of disability pride.
While unique, LaSpina's journey is also one with which many disabled people can identify. It is the journey to find one's place in an ableist world - a world not made for disabled people, where disability is only seen in negative terms. LaSpina refutes all stereotypical narratives of disability. Through the telling of her life's story, without editorializing, she shows the harm that the overwhelming focus on pity and on a cure that remains elusive has done to disabled people. Her story exposes the disability prejudice ingrained in our sociopolitical system and denounces the oppressive standards of normalcy in a society that devalues those who are different and denies them basic rights.
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Story
Twin sisters Bibike and Ariyike are enjoying a relatively comfortable life in Lagos in 1996. Then their mother loses her job due to political strife, and the family, facing poverty, is drawn into the New Church, an institution led by a charismatic pastor who is not shy about worshipping earthly wealth. Soon Bibike and Ariyike's father wagers the family home on a sure bet that evaporates like smoke.
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Good Story - Awful accents
- By Tamara C-J on 02-15-21
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Little Matches
- A Memoir of Finding Light in the Dark
- By: Maryanne O'Hara
- Narrated by: Maryanne O'Hara
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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When their only child was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF) at the age of two, Maryanne O'Hara and her husband were told that Caitlin could live a long life or be dead in a matter of months. Thirty-one years later, Caitlin lost her battle with this devastating disease following an excruciating two-year wait on the transplant list and a last-minute race to locate a pair of healthy lungs. The sudden spiral of events left Maryanne in an existential crisis, searching to find an answer to the eternal question: Why we are here?
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I don't know who needs to read it...
- By H. Hill on 04-18-23
By: Maryanne O'Hara
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Because I Come from a Crazy Family
- The Making of a Psychiatrist
- By: Edward M. Hallowell
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 13 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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When Edward M. Hallowell was 11, a voice out of nowhere told him he should become a psychiatrist. A mental health professional of the time would have called this psychosis. But young Edward (Ned) took it in stride, despite not quite knowing what "psychiatrist" meant. With a psychotic father, an alcoholic mother, an abusive stepfather, and two so-called learning disabilities of his own, Ned was accustomed to unpredictable behaviour from those around him and to a mind he felt he couldn't always control.
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Love and connection permeates through this book!
- By Steve Steinmetz on 06-29-18
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Missing Parts
- By: Lucinda Berry
- Narrated by: Abby Craden
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Growing up abandoned by her father and raised by a single mother, Celeste was determined to create the perfect family - but even perfect families have secrets. Her days are filled with a rewarding career, a devoted husband, and her four-year-old daughter. Celeste is the only one who knows the precarious house of cards her family is built upon - until the day her daughter falls critically ill. Then her world quickly spirals out of control, her secret threatening to destroy her marriage, family, reputation, and sanity.
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SPOILER ALERT. Sigh...
- By Kelly on 10-08-20
By: Lucinda Berry
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Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
- By: Danielle Evans
- Narrated by: Daniel Deadwyler, Jeanette Illidge, Je Nie Fleming, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Striking in their emotional immediacy, the stories in Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self are based in a world where inequality is reality but where the insecurities of adolescence and young adulthood, and the tensions within family and the community, are sometimes the biggest complicating forces in one's sense of identity and the choices one makes.
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things we do to oursekves
- By Jamintel on 02-06-23
By: Danielle Evans
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True Grit and Grace
- Turning Tragedy into Triumph
- By: Amberly Lago
- Narrated by: Amberly Lago
- Length: 4 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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True Grit and Grace tells the story of a woman's life forever altered by a horrific motorcycle accident that shattered her right leg. Despite the initial recommendation to amputate, she endured 34 surgeries to save it. However, as a sexual-abuse and divorce survivor, she determined to save not only her leg, but her career, her dreams, and her dignity.
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Amazing!!
- By Аmazon Customer on 08-06-23
By: Amberly Lago
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The Undocumented Americans
- By: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Narrated by: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio
- Length: 4 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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Writer Karla Cornejo Villavicencio was on DACA when she decided to write about being undocumented for the first time using her own name. It was right after the election of 2016, the day she realized the story she'd tried to steer clear of was the only one she wanted to tell. So she wrote her immigration lawyer's phone number on her hand in Sharpie and embarked on a trip across the country to tell the stories of her fellow undocumented immigrants—and to find the hidden key to her own.
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Raw, heartbreaking - we can do better by others
- By RapaciousReader on 04-11-20
What listeners say about Such a Pretty Girl
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- just asking for some common sense
- 04-09-22
A well-written and narrated eye opener
I cannot say enough good things about this book. It was an education, but it was sad, hopeful, angering, funny, heartwarming, inspiring, and honest. Nadina LaSpina doesn't sugar coat things or beg for pity. She asks for respect, access, and equality.
Nadina LaSpina is an educator and activist. She had polio as a child in Sicily which left her disabled. her parents brought her to America hoping for a cure. Despite much medical care a cure was not to be. This book chronicles her journey as well as some disability history.
This book had me in in the first few minutes and kept my interest until the end. I would love for her to write a shorter middle grade version because I think she has a lot to teach to children as well. I would want the audiobook to be narrated by Jennifer Jill Araya as well. I enjoyed the narration so much that once in a while I forgot it was someone else.
If I could give this 6 stars I would.
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- Ms. Kirsty L. Collins
- 01-13-23
A great multicultural disability story set in NY!
I really enjoyed listening to Nadina LaSpina’s autobiography about growing up with polio and being an immigrant in New York.
It’s interesting to hear how all the different barriers in her life affected her. Also the lifelong dedication to disability rights activism.
And how relationships with men worked or didn’t work. There was a lot of things I didn’t know about. I’m at the beginning of my disability activism journey so this was really helpful and inspiring. I love how she talks about the reality of having a relationship with a man with MS. This is such a frightening disease to me because it’s so unfamiliar. I feel like I will be a bit better advocate and ally after reading this book. Thank you so much Nadina for writing this. You are impressive, caring, courageous, hard working and beautiful!
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- Mel Tanzman
- 01-01-23
A very special woman’s personal story of disability, growth and liberation
Those who have read Judy Heumann’s “Being Heumann” will find this a wonderful companion book. It is especially poignant for me having the privilege of knowing, loving, celebrating and singing with so many of these folks. I’m hoping someone will find it compelling and make a movie. For all of you free spirits who refuse to fall into the regular mold
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