Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head
Poems
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Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head
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Narrated by:
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Warsan Shire
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By:
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Warsan Shire
About this listen
Poems of migration, womanhood, trauma, and resilience from the celebrated collaborator on Beyoncé’s Lemonade and Black Is King, award-winning Somali British poet Warsan Shire
“The beautifully crafted poems in this collection are fiercely tender gifts.”—Roxane Gay, author of Bad Feminist
“Warsan Shire is our ultimate modern poet. . . . This is our James Baldwin.”—The New York Times Culture Desk
LONGLISTED FOR THE GRIFFIN POETRY PRIZE • ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: Vanity Fair, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly
Mama, I made it / out of your home / alive, raised by / the voices / in my head.
With her first full-length poetry collection, Warsan Shire introduces us to a young girl, who, in the absence of a nurturing guide, makes her own way toward womanhood. Drawing from her own life, as well as pop culture and news headlines, Shire finds vivid, unique details in the experiences of refugees and immigrants, mothers and daughters, Black women and teenage girls. In Shire’s hands, lives spring into fullness. This is noisy life, full of music and weeping and surahs and sirens and birds. This is fragrant life, full of blood and perfume and shisha smoke and jasmine and incense. This is polychrome life, full of henna and moonlight and lipstick and turmeric and kohl. The long-awaited collection from one of our most exciting contemporary poets, this book is a blessing, an incantatory celebration of resilience and survival. Each reader will come away changed.
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Critic reviews
LONGLISTED FOR THE 2023 GRIFFIN POETRY PRIZE
SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2023 DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE
One of: Vogue's "The Best Books of 2022: A Preview
Lit Hub's "Most Anticipated Books of 2022"
Esquire UK's "The Best Books of 2022 Will Provoke, Persuade and Perturb You"
BuzzFeed's "26 Books To Get Excited About This Year"
The New Statesman's "15 Best Books for Summer 2022"
Stylist (UK)’s “Christmas gift guide for book lovers”
Goodreads’s “Best poetry books of 2022"
The Guardian’s “Best poetry books of 2022”
"Vital, moving and courageous, this is a debut not to be missed."
—The Guardian
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-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 29
This beautiful and haunting novel bares the soul of a Hawaiian-American family during World War II. As you share in the Meahuna family's misfortunes and triumphs, a sense of intense intimacy evolves. Cristine McMurdo-Wallis lets you savor the family members' remarkable, heartwrenching stories as they are revealed piece by piece in language rich with sensuous detail.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Stunning Historical Novel
- By Mimi Routh on 05-27-19
By: Kiana Davenport
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Palimpsest
- By: Catherynne M. Valente
- Narrated by: Aasne Vigesaa
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 165
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 137
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Story4 out of 5 stars 134
Between life and death, dreaming and waking, at the train stop beyond the end of the world is the city of Palimpsest. To get there is a miracle, a mystery, a gift, and a curse - a voyage permitted only to those who’ve always believed there’s another world than the one that meets the eye. Those fated to make the passage are marked forever by a map of that wondrous city tattooed on their flesh after a single orgasmic night. To this kingdom of ghost trains, lion-priests, living kanji, and cream-filled canals come four travelers.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Excellent Prose, but lacks maturity
- By Michael on 08-09-15
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Above Us Only Sky
- By: Michele Young-Stone
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 9 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 81
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4 out of 5 stars 75
Prudence Eleanor Vilkas was born with a pair of wings molded to her back. Considered a birth defect, her wings were surgically removed, leaving only the ghost of them behind. Growing up in Los Vientos, Florida, Prudence meets her long-estranged Lithuanian grandfather and discovers a miraculous lineage beating and pulsing with past Lithuanian bird-women.
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4 out of 5 stars
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I'm So Glad I Listened to It!
- By Elizabeth on 08-22-16
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Freshwater
- By: Akwaeke Emezi
- Narrated by: Akwaeke Emezi
- Length: 6 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 717
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 635
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Story4 out of 5 stars 632
An extraordinary debut novel, Freshwater explores the surreal experience of having a fractured self. It centers around a young Nigerian woman, Ada, who develops separate selves within her as a result of being born "with one foot on the other side". Unsettling, heart-wrenching, dark, and powerful, Freshwater is a sharp evocation of a rare way of experiencing the world, one that illuminates how we all construct our identities. Ada begins her life in the south of Nigeria as a troubled baby and a source of deep concern to her family.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Just ok.
- By Alexa on 07-02-18
By: Akwaeke Emezi
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The Blue Between Sky and Water
- By: Susan Abulhawa
- Narrated by: Jennifer Woodward
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 78
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 71
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 71
It is 1947, and Beit Daras, a quiet village in Palestine surrounded by olive groves, is home to the Baraka family. Eldest daughter Nazmiyeh looks after her widowed mother, prone to wandering and strange outbursts, while her brother, Mamdouh, tends to the village bees. Their younger sister, Mariam, with her striking mismatched eyes, spends her days talking to imaginary friends and writing.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Horrible pronunciation
- By Debra Sabah Press on 11-08-18
By: Susan Abulhawa
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Her Body and Other Parties
- Stories
- By: Carmen Maria Machado
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 633
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 544
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 551
In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado blithely demolishes the arbitrary borders between psychological realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. While her work has earned her comparisons to Karen Russell and Kelly Link, she has a voice that is all her own. In this electric and provocative debut, Machado bends genre to shape startling narratives that map the realities of women's lives and the violence visited upon their bodies.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Beautiful
- By Anonymous User on 11-17-17
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The Death of Artemio Cruz
- A Novel
- By: Carlos Fuentes, Alfred MacAdam - translator
- Narrated by: Tony Chiroldes
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 96
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 80
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 80
As the novel opens, Artemio Cruz, the all-powerful newspaper magnate and land baron, lies confined to his bed and, in dreamlike flashes, recalls the pivotal episodes of his life. Carlos Fuentes manipulates the ensuing kaleidoscope of images with dazzling inventiveness, layering memory upon memory, from Cruz’s heroic campaigns during the Mexican Revolution, through his relentless climb from poverty to wealth, to his uneasy death. Perhaps Fuentes’ masterpiece, The Death of Artemio Cruz is a haunting voyage into the soul of modern Mexico.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Writing
- By Kelly B. on 05-01-14
By: Carlos Fuentes, and others
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The Song Poet
- A Memoir of My Father
- By: Kao Kalia Yang
- Narrated by: Kao Kalia Yang
- Length: 8 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 72
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 67
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Story5 out of 5 stars 65
Bee lost his father as a young boy and keenly felt his orphanhood. He would wander from one neighbor to the next, collecting the things they said to each other, whispering the words to himself at night until one day a song was born. Bee sings the life of his people through the war-torn jungle and a Thai refugee camp. But the songs fall away in the cold, bitter world of a Minneapolis housing project and on the factory floor until, with the death of Bee's mother, the songs leave him for good.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Beautiful, full of sadness, power, and heart.
- By Melissa L. Magana on 04-27-17
By: Kao Kalia Yang
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Henna House
- By: Nomi Eve
- Narrated by: Hillary Huber
- Length: 13 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 186
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 167
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 166
Yemen in 1920: After passage of the Orphan's Decree, any unbetrothed Jewish child left orphaned will be instantly adopted by the local Muslim community. With her parents' health failing, and no spousal prospects in sight, Adela Damari's situation looks dire until her uncle arrives from a faraway city, bringing with him a cousin and aunt who introduce Adela to the powerful rituals of henna tattooing.
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2 out of 5 stars
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historical fiction, read like an autobiography.
- By Anonymous User on 02-11-19
By: Nomi Eve
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The Incarnations
- A Novel
- By: Susan Barker
- Narrated by: Timo Chen, Joy Osmanski
- Length: 14 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 177
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 162
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Story4 out of 5 stars 162
Who are you? You must be wondering. I am your soul mate, your old friend, and I have come back to this city of 16 million in search of you. So begins the first letter that falls into Wang's lap as he flips down the visor in his taxi. The letters that follow are filled with the stories of Wang's previous lives - from escaping a marriage to a spirit bride to being a slave on the run from Genghis Khan to living as a fisherman during the Opium Wars and being a teenager on the Red Guard during the cultural revolution.
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3 out of 5 stars
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What was that you said?
- By cecil reniche-smith on 08-29-15
By: Susan Barker
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Midnight's Children
- By: Salman Rushdie
- Narrated by: Lyndam Gregory
- Length: 24 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 2,004
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,592
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Story4 out of 5 stars 1,577
Salman Rushdie holds the literary world in awe with a jaw-dropping catalog of critically acclaimed novels that have made him one of the world's most celebrated authors. Winner of the prestigious Booker of Bookers, Midnight's Children tells the story of Saleem Sinai, born on the stroke of India's independence.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Outstanding book, superb narration
- By MarcS on 06-09-09
By: Salman Rushdie
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Sula
- By: Toni Morrison
- Narrated by: Toni Morrison
- Length: 5 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,090
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,713
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,709
Nel and Sula's devotion is fierce enough to withstand bullies and the burden of a dreadful secret. It endures even after Nel has grown up to be a pillar of the black community and Sula has become a pariah. But their friendship ends in an unforgivable betrayal—or does it end? Terrifying, comic, ribald and tragic, Sula is a work that overflows with life.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Good against evil and a riotous story to boot
- By Karen on 04-11-11
By: Toni Morrison
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New American Best Friend
- By: Olivia Gatwood
- Narrated by: Olivia Gatwood
- Length: 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 17
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 14
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Story5 out of 5 stars 13
One of the most recognizable young poets in America, Olivia Gatwood dazzles with her tribute to contemporary American womanhood in her debut book, New American Best Friend. Gatwood's poems deftly deconstruct traditional stereotypes. The focus shifts from childhood to adulthood, gender to sexuality, violence to joy. And always and inexorably, the book moves toward celebration, culminating in a series of odes: odes to the body, to tough women, to embracing your own journey in all its failures and triumphs.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Amazing poetry, but the music
- By Keaira on 07-29-19
By: Olivia Gatwood
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The Gods of Tango
- A Novel
- By: Carolina De Robertis
- Narrated by: Carolina De Robertis
- Length: 14 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 116
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 105
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 105
February 1913: seventeen-year-old Leda, carrying only a small trunk and her father's cherished violin, leaves her Italian village for a new home, and a new husband, in Argentina. Arriving in Buenos Aires, she discovers that he has been killed, but she remains: living in a tenement, without friends or family, on the brink of destitution. Still, she is seduced by the music that underscores life in the city: tango, born from lower-class immigrant voices, now the illicit, scandalous dance of brothels and cabarets.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A rousing tale
- By Jean on 07-24-15
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Radiance
- By: Catherynne M. Valente
- Narrated by: Heath Miller
- Length: 13 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 141
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 129
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 130
Severin Unck's father is a famous director of Gothic romances in an alternate 1986 in which talking movies are still a daring innovation due to the patent-hoarding Edison family. Rebelling against her father's films of passion, intrigue, and spirits from beyond, Severin starts making documentaries, traveling through space and investigating the levitator cults of Neptune and the lawless saloons of Mars.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Unexpected and tons of fun
- By Kate on 11-17-15
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A Bound Woman is a Dangerous Thing
- The Incarceration of African American Women from Harriet Tubman to Sandra Bland
- By: DaMaris B. Hill
- Narrated by: Mia Ellis
- Length: 1 hr and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 26
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 23
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 23
From Harriet Tubman to Assata Shakur, Ida B. Wells to Sandra Bland and Black Lives Matter, black women freedom fighters have braved violence, scorn, despair and isolation in order to lodge their protests. In A Bound Woman Is a Dangerous Thing, DaMaris Hill honours their experiences with at times harrowing, at times hopeful responses to her heroes.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Brilliant
- By Andrea Reynolds on 09-19-19
By: DaMaris B. Hill
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The Stories of Eva Luna
- By: Isabel Allende
- Narrated by: Elizabeth Pena
- Length: 2 hrs and 44 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 103
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 71
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Story4 out of 5 stars 70
Immerse yourself in a world of love, vengeance, compassion, and irony with the evocative stories of Eva Luna. Author Isabel Allende introduced this well-loved character to audiences in her earlier novel, Eva Luna. Listen to Allende talk about the role of writing in her life in Giving Birth, Finding Form. This program also features Alice Walker and Jean Shinoda Bolen.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Better some Allende than no Allende
- By Perschon on 12-04-14
By: Isabel Allende
What listeners say about Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Perica112
- 03-18-22
Beautifully done
Warsan shires voice is so… beautifully apt. Her words are delivered in such a way that i was transported. I was the subject and the writer. Loved every piece of this work. Thank you warsan shire for sharing this with the world.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Ruben
- 01-29-23
Oh my
How beautiful. How tragic. How wonderful the ups and downs of life. The things we go through
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