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There are currently 41 member reviews
for The Same Sky
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Sarah N. (Corte Madera, CA)
The Same Sky...Great book!!!
I was lucky that I picked up this book the night we changed the clocks back--it gave me an extra hour of uninterrupted reading. I kept wondering how these two lives were going to intersect. FABULOUS! I have two questions...Would a 12 year-old really be able to live alone and care for a younger sibling with no family, friends or government to help them out?
Question number 2. In the end, was it chance or did they know each other?
This book made me proud for Carla for being brave. Proud for Alice for accepting that "...it's the way it is."
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Pam McK (Lake Mary, FL)
So worth the read
The brief descriptive preview of the book drew my attention immediately. I thought I knew by the title where the book was going, and the author's choice of style - going from one voice to the other of the two voices back and forth throughout the novel - seemed to confirm my suspicions. Artfully describing two different worlds, with a subject matter very much on the minds and hearts of most Americans today, it was very much worth the read.
The two women from vastly different circumstances told very similar stories. Both mothers are broken-hearted over loss, but both are also strong, resilient, and capable fighters. The writer wrote convincingly from each of the two perspectives. There was no sense of prejudice for one viewpoint or the other, no over-dramatization, no hints of a political or moral point of view whatsoever.
I felt this was a well-written and believable narrative that evoked both sympathy and anger over some of the issues we are faced with today. The easy flowing story highlighted the dichotomy between protecting our borders, and protecting the welfare of the endangered. The writer exemplified the difficult balance that lies between protection for current laws on the one hand, and protecting those who would break them on the other, subtly suggesting there is no simple 'one size fits all' answer.
The ending was bittersweet, but satisfying. I thoroughly enjoyed and would recommend this book!
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Susan B. (Sarasota, FL)
Same sky, two separate stories
Loved this book.
Alice and her husband live in Texas. They want to adopt a child more than anything but so many things need to be worked out.
Carla is a eleven year old living in Honduras who needs to make decisions even an adult would find hard. On her own with a younger brother, she realizes their only hope is to get to their mother in America. She had made it to Texas years ago and occasionally sends money to them. Her brother is getting in with the wrong group, sniffing glue, and her only hope for a good life is to get them both out of the dangerous place they live.
The journey she takes had me reading the book as quickly as I could to see what would happen to her, at the same time Alice is going thru her own journey.
Their lives collide, but not in the way I had anticipated.
A great book for a bookclub and/or just a good read.
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Priscilla K. (San Antonio, TX)
The Tale of Two Desperate Women
I really liked the two story concept for each person. And the ending was a surprise but pleasantly joyful. The underlying hardships these two women went through was heartbreaking but rewarding their sorrows with strength at the end. One woman (young adult) was desperate to find her mother and give up her newborn baby; and the other woman was desperately in need to a child.
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Darra W. (Walnut Creek, CA)
Great book-group book!
I've been a fan of this author's work since publication of her debut ("Sleep Toward Heaven"), and her newest novel is no exception. In "The Same Sky," Ward employs alternating narrators--Alice, approaching 40 and desperate for a child denied her both by nature and adoption, and Carla, an 11-year-old Honduran seeking reunion with her absent mother--to explore a multitude of up-to-the-moment AND universal themes. Infertility, immigration, family, motherhood, loss: this novel walks a fine line between heartache and hope, offering rich (and potentially controversial) fodder for book-group discussion. The pages flew by!
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Donna N. (Casa Grande, AZ)
Great title
What a wonderful book! Connects a good life with a longing for a child with a young girl who takes her younger brother from Honduras to Texas. Certainly very timely given the recent events on the border. No matter where you stand on immigration it gives you many things on which to reflect. What would you have do if you lived in an extremely poverty stricken country? Is there room in ones heart to do what Alice did? Definitely a book that will stay with you. Amanda Ward is my new addition to authors I must read.
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Beverly S. (Chesterton, IN)
Very sad and yet uplifting. It made me cry.
This is my first time to read a book by Amanda Eyre Ward, but it will not be my last. I like her writing style and enjoyed the development of her two main characters.
The back story shows us two very different young ladies and their struggles in their daily lives. Alice lives in American and Carla lives in Honduras. Their lives will merge before the book ends, but you will not be disappointed.
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