Mecca
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Mecca
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Narrated by:
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Patricia R. Floyd
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Frankie Corzo
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Shaun Taylor-Corbett
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By:
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Susan Straight
About this listen
Johnny Frías has California in his blood. A descendant of the state’s indigenous people and Mexican settlers, he has Southern California’s forgotten towns and canyons in his soul. He spends his days as a highway patrolman pulling over speeders, ignoring their racist insults, and pushing past the trauma of his rookie year, when he killed a man assaulting a young woman named Bunny, who ran from the scene, leaving Johnny without a witness. But like the Santa Ana winds that every year bring the risk of fire, Johnny’s moment of action twenty years ago sparked a slow-burning chain of connections that unites a vibrant, complex cast of characters in ways they never see coming.
In Mecca, the celebrated novelist Susan Straight crafts an unforgettable American epic, examining race, history, family, and destiny through the interlocking stories of a group of native Californians all gasping for air. With sensitivity, furor, and a cinematic scope that captures California in all its injustice, history, and glory, she tells a story of the American West through the eyes of the people who built it—and continue to sustain it. As the stakes get higher and the intertwined characters in Mecca slam against barrier after barrier, they find that when push comes to shove, it’s always better to push back.
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 462
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 412
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 413
Zou Lei, orphan of the desert, migrates to work in America and finds herself slaving in New York's kitchens. She falls in love with a young man whose heart has been broken in another desert. A new life may be possible if together they can survive homelessness, lockup, and the young man's nightmares, which may be more prophecy than madness.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Incredible craftsmanship.
- By B.J. on 04-23-15
By: Atticus Lish
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Like Family
- Growing Up in Other People's Houses, a Memoir
- By: Paula McLain
- Narrated by: Wendy Tremont King
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 78
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 71
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Story4 out of 5 stars 72
This powerful and haunting memoir details the years Paula McLain and her two sisters spent as foster children after being abandoned by both parents in California in the early 1970s. As wards of the State, the sisters spent the next 14 years moving from foster home to foster home. The dislocations, confusions, and odd pleasures of an unrooted life form the basis of one of the most compelling memoirs in recent years - a book in the tradition of Jo Ann Beard's The Boys of My Youth and Mary Karr's The Liars' Club.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A famous writer describes her life growing up in foster care
- By Nancy C. on 12-21-18
By: Paula McLain
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Fourth of July Creek
- A Novel
- By: Smith Henderson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews, Jenna Lamia
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 761
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 677
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Story4 out of 5 stars 677
After trying to help Benjamin Pearl, an undernourished, nearly feral 11-year-old boy living in the Montana wilderness, social worker Pete Snow comes face-to-face with the boy's profoundly disturbed father, Jeremiah. With courage and caution, Pete slowly earns a measure of trust from this paranoid survivalist itching for a final conflict that will signal the coming End Times. But as Pete's own family spins out of control, Pearl's activities spark the full-blown interest of the FBI, putting Pete at the center of a massive manhunt from which no one will emerge unscathed.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The Ghost of Tom Joad & the Wrath of Grapes
- By Mel on 06-30-14
By: Smith Henderson
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Signals: New and Selected Stories
- By: Tim Gautreaux
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 27
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 26
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 27
After the stunning historical novels The Clearing and The Missing, Tim Gautreaux now ranges freely through contemporary life with 12 new stories and eight from previous collections. Most are set in his beloved Louisiana, many hard by or on the Mississippi River, others in North Carolina, and even in midwinter Minnesota. But generally it's heat, humidity, and bugs that beset his people as they wrestle with affairs of the heart, matters of faith, and the pros and cons of tight-knit communities.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Perfection! Amazing writer/amazing reader
- By Monique on 01-08-19
By: Tim Gautreaux
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She Got Up Off the Couch
- By: Haven Kimmel
- Narrated by: Haven Kimmel
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 274
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 186
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 187
When we last saw Zippy, she was oblivious to the storm that was brewing in her home. Her mother, Delonda, had literally just gotten up off the couch and ridden her rickety bicycle down the road. Her dad was off somewhere, gambling or "working." And Zippy was lost in her own fabulous world of exploring the fringes of Moorland, Indiana.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great fun !!
- By Kim on 04-20-11
By: Haven Kimmel
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Nine Lives
- Mystery, Magic, Death, and Life in New Orleans
- By: Dan Baum
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 14 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 134
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 116
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 116
Nines Lives is a multivoiced biography of a dazzling, surreal, and imperiled city, told through the lives of nine unforgettable characters and bracketed by two epic storms: Hurricane Betsy, which transformed New Orleans in the 1960s, and Hurricane Katrina, which nearly destroyed it. Dan Baum brings this kaleidoscopic portrait to life, showing us what was lost in the storm and what remains to be saved.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Do not miss if you're interested in New Orleans
- By Kelly on 03-22-18
By: Dan Baum
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The Free
- A Novel (P.S.)
- By: Willy Vlautin
- Narrated by: Willy Vlautin
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 47
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 47
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 47
In his heartbreaking yet hopeful fourth novel, award-winning author Willy Vlautin demonstrates his extraordinary talent for illuminating the disquiet of modern American life, captured in the experiences of three memorable characters looking for meaning in distressing times. Severely wounded in the Iraq war, Leroy Kervin has lived in a group home for eight years. Frustrated by the simplest daily routines, he finds his existence has become unbearable.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Free Fallin', Brilliantly
- By W Perry Hall on 03-11-14
By: Willy Vlautin
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Navajos Wear Nikes
- A Reservation Life
- By: Jim Kristofic
- Narrated by: Jim Kristofic
- Length: 8 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 489
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 438
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 439
Just before starting second grade, Jim Kristofic moved from Pittsburgh across the country to Ganado, Arizona, when his mother took a job at a hospital on the Navajo Reservation. Navajos Wear Nikes reveals the complexity of modern life on the Navajo Reservation, a world where Anglo and Navajo coexisted in a tenuous truce. After the births of his Navajo half-siblings, Jim and his family moved off the Reservation to an Arizona border town where they struggled to readapt to an Anglo world that no longer felt like home.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Entertaining and Educational
- By Savanna A Harvey on 07-13-15
By: Jim Kristofic
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Prayers for the Stolen
- A Novel
- By: Jennifer Clement
- Narrated by: Justine Eyre
- Length: 5 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 60
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 50
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 47
Ladydi Garcia Martinez was born into a world where being a girl is a dangerous thing. In the mountains of Guerrero, Mexico, women must fend for themselves, as their men have left to seek opportunities elsewhere. While her mother waits in vain for her husband's return, Ladydi and her friends dream of a future that holds more promise than mere survival, finding humor, solidarity, and fun in the face of so much tragedy. When Ladydi is offered work as a nanny for a wealthy family in Acapulco, she seizes the chance and finds her first taste of love with a young caretaker there.
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3 out of 5 stars
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I don’t know how to feel about this...
- By Candice on 01-21-21
By: Jennifer Clement
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Pay Dirt Road
- By: Samantha Jayne Allen
- Narrated by: Sandy Rustin
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 369
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 328
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Story4 out of 5 stars 328
Annie McIntyre has a love/hate relationship with Garnett, Texas. Recently graduated from college and home waitressing, lacking not in ambition but certainly in direction, Annie is lured into the family business—a private investigation firm—by her supposed-to-be-retired grandfather, Leroy, despite the rest of the clan's misgivings.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Narration
- By Cindy Buell NZ on 05-04-22
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Close Range
- Wyoming Stories (Selected Unabridged Stories)
- By: Annie Proulx
- Narrated by: Frances Fisher, Bruce Greenwood, Campbell Scott
- Length: 5 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 206
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 117
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 119
Annie Proulx's masterful language and fierce love of Wyoming are evident in this collection of stories about loneliness, quick violence, and wrong kinds of love. In "The Mud Below", a rodeo rider's obsession marks the deepening fissures between his family life and self-imposed isolation. In "The Half-Skinned Steer", an elderly fool drives west to the ranch he grew up on for his brother's funeral, and dies a mile from home.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Wonderfully Ironic and Surprising Read
- By Susan L. Stewart on 04-21-12
By: Annie Proulx
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A Death in Kitchawank, and Other Stories
- By: T. C. Boyle
- Narrated by: T. C. Boyle
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 100
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 93
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Story4 out of 5 stars 90
Few authors write with such sheer love of story and language as T. C. Boyle, and that is nowhere more evident than in his inventive, wickedly funny, and always entertaining short stories. Here are 14 new tales previously unpublished in book form. By turns mythic and realistic, farcical and tragic, ironic and moving, Boyle's stories have mapped a wide range of human emotions. The stories here reflect his maturing themes.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Mixed Bag
- By AuntGert on 09-22-20
By: T. C. Boyle
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The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley
- By: Hannah Tinti
- Narrated by: Elizabeth Wiley
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 487
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 445
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Story4 out of 5 stars 443
After years spent living on the run, Samuel Hawley moves with his teenage daughter, Loo, to Olympus, Massachusetts. There, in his late wife's hometown, Hawley finds work as a fisherman, while Loo struggles to fit in at school and grows curious about her mother's mysterious death. Haunting them both are twelve scars Hawley carries on his body, from twelve bullets in his criminal past - a past that eventually spills over into his daughter's present, until together they must face a reckoning yet to come.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Odd choice for narrator
- By lindsey b. on 01-23-19
By: Hannah Tinti
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Homesick for Another World
- Stories
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan, Richard Poe
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 299
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 265
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Story4 out of 5 stars 265
There's something eerily unsettling about Ottessa Moshfegh's stories, something almost dangerous, while also being delightful and even laugh-out-loud funny. Her characters are all unsteady on their feet in one way or another; they all yearn for connection and betterment, though each in very different ways, but they are often tripped up by their own baser impulses and existential insecurities.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Funny, Dynamic Writing
- By Sofia Macht on 06-13-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
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Turtle Moon
- By: Alice Hoffman
- Narrated by: Sandra Burr
- Length: 7 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 130
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 109
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Story4 out of 5 stars 109
Turtle Moon transports the listener to Verity, Florida, a place where anything can happen during the month of May, when migrating sea turtles come to town, mistaking the glow of the streetlights for the moon. A young single mother is murdered in her apartment and her baby is gone. Keith, a 12-year-old boy in the same apartment building also disappears. In pursuit of the baby, the boy and the killer, are Keith's divorced mother and a cop who himself was once considered the meanest boy in town.
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5 out of 5 stars
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An enchanting story
- By A.J. on 05-09-11
By: Alice Hoffman
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Fruit of the Drunken Tree
- A Novel
- By: Ingrid Rojas Contreras
- Narrated by: Marisol Ramirez, Almarie Guerra, Ingrid Rojas Contreras
- Length: 12 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 638
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 570
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 568
Seven-year-old Chula and her older sister, Cassandra, enjoy carefree lives thanks to their gated community in Bogotá, but the threat of kidnappings, car bombs, and assassinations hover just outside the neighborhood walls, where the godlike drug lord Pablo Escobar continues to elude authorities and capture the attention of the nation. When their mother hires Petrona, a live-in-maid from the city's guerrilla-occupied slum, Chula makes it her mission to understand Petrona's mysterious ways.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Maybe better to read this book than listen???
- By Amazon Customer on 12-12-18
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A False Dawn
- By: Tom Lowe
- Narrated by: Michael David Axtell
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 255
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 234
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Story4 out of 5 stars 234
Before the death of his wife, Sean O'Brien makes a promise to her that he has no plans to break - until he starts building a new life in an old cabin on a remote stretch of a tropical river in the heart of Florida. It's there that he discovers an injured young woman who whispers a cryptic message into his ear.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Wonderful first novel in the Sean O'Brien series
- By Wayne on 05-07-17
By: Tom Lowe
What listeners say about Mecca
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
- Vickilynne
- 10-17-22
I live in the area
The story was OK but for me it was personally interesting because I live in the areas and I have been in many of the specific areas mentioned in the book. Nice to read how someone describes your geographic area.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Anonymous User
- 10-10-22
An eye opening read
Never will I take my comfortable white life for granted after this provocative read. Susan Straight paints pictures of people and cultures and assumptions and prejudices that will linger with me and should be required high school reading especially in California.
Looking forward to my book club discussion!
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2 people found this helpful
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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
- C A Levine
- 08-21-22
Loved this story of my homeland
Don’t think I know of other novels that capture my homeland, it’s people, and the contemporary conflicts arising from history, so I found this story enthralling. Knowing many similar people from this part of California (Inland Empire), and the description of the landscape resonated with me.
Sorry when it ended. I was ready for much more.
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2 people found this helpful
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story3 out of 5 stars
- anon222
- 06-05-23
What happened to the ending?
Really great book! …
Except for abrupt ending. That was a rude thing to do to engaged readers.
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story1 out of 5 stars
- Pam H.
- 05-13-22
Disappointing
Something was off. Never really knew the characters, just the words they said. It left a negative feeling for me.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall2 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Larry Sandusky
- 05-19-23
Interesting Nuggets
Valuable and interesting elements, but overall disconnected, no real overarching theme or coherence. Terrible and disconnected ending.
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