{"id":36213,"date":"2019-05-29T23:16:00","date_gmt":"2019-05-30T03:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=36213"},"modified":"2019-05-29T23:16:00","modified_gmt":"2019-05-30T03:16:00","slug":"review-of-on-the-come-up-by-angie-thomas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=36213","title":{"rendered":"Review of On the Come Up, by Angie Thomas"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>On the Come Up<\/em><\/p>\n

by Angie Thomas
\nperformed by Bahni Turpin<\/p>\n

HarperCollins, 2019. 11.75 hours on 10 discs.
\nStarred Review
\nReview written May 18, 2019, from a library audiobook<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a second book by Angie Thomas, set in the same city of Garden Heights as her award-winning debut novel, The Hate U Give<\/a><\/em>. Sixteen-year-old Bri has noticed a greater police presence in Garden Heights since the shooting from the earlier book and the protests that followed. They\u2019ve also found that the security guards at her private school target the black and brown kids.<\/p>\n

But right now, all Bri is concerned about is getting her big break. She\u2019s loved to rap since she was a little girl. Her father was a rapper before her, but he was shot in gang violence when she was small. Now Bri is going to compete in the Ring, and what happens there gets her some attention.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Bri gets harassed and thrown to the ground by school security, who called her a hoodlum. That\u2019s simmering in her brain when she gets a chance to record a song, \u201cOn the Come Up.\u201d<\/p>\n

The song is popular \u2013 but plenty of people take it the wrong way. And that gets Bri\u2019s temper flaring. Which doesn\u2019t make her mother happy. But what her mother doesn\u2019t know won\u2019t hurt her. She recently lost her job, and if Bri can make it big as a rapper, maybe she can keep the electricity on and change all their lives.<\/p>\n

One thing I love about this book and listening to the audio is that you get to hear the rapping. It bothers me when authors write about characters doing well in a competition but don\u2019t let you see or hear what they use to compete. (A recent book that did that was Poet X<\/em>, by Elizabeth Acevedo. It\u2019s a wonderful book \u2013 but what poems did Xiomara use in the poetry slam?) In this audiobook, you get to hear \u201cOn the Come Up,\u201d and I promise it will start going through your head.<\/p>\n

One word of warning is that there\u2019s plenty of profanity in this audiobook, so you probably won\u2019t want to make this family listening \u2013 young kids might pick up more than the songs.<\/p>\n

But if you\u2019re looking for a profound book about dreams of making it as an artist combined with social issues and dealing with poverty and family dynamics and friendship dynamics and the question of what constitutes selling out \u2013 this wonderfully entertaining audiobook does all of that.<\/p>\n

angiethomas.com<\/a>
\nharperaudio.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on Sonderbooks<\/a> at: www.sonderbooks.com\/Teens\/on_the_come_up.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.<\/p>\n

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but I maintain my website and blogs on my own time. The views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.<\/p>\n

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