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42nd out of 42 books
—
75 voters
An Island Like You: Stories of the Barrio
Twelve stories about young people caught between their Puerto Rican heritage and their American surroundings.
Paperback
Published
December 1st 1996
by Puffin
(first published March 1st 1995)
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Oct 05, 2011
William Garcia
added it
I really liked the story "Catch The Moon" I thought that the story was really relatable to what many teenagers are going through. It shows how different people cope with sadness and a really common way to cope with sadness is to turn it into anger. Turning sadness into anger isnt a good way to cope because not only does it affect you but it affects the people abround you as well. I also liked how the brought Naomi into the story because it made luis realize that there are people that are going t...more
An Island Like You is both culture-specific and relatable. Any teen can relate to feeling invisible, being bullied, losing a parent, having a lack of direction, and being “different.” However, what all the teens have in common is the fact that they are Puerto Rican and living in the same neighborhood, or as they called it, barrio.
Many of the teens are first generation American. Their parents were born in Puerto Rico and their grandparents may even still live there, like Rita’s. Rita and Doris d...more
Many of the teens are first generation American. Their parents were born in Puerto Rico and their grandparents may even still live there, like Rita’s. Rita and Doris d...more
Oct 05, 2011
Nancy Luu
marked it as to-read
I really enjoyed the short story "Catch the Moon" I thought it was a good story because the author had really good descriptions of the character. The author included diologue that was good and some parts was in another language to show what was the character. I also enjoy it because of the different point of view of the character, from Luis thinking about Naomi when he first saw her to Luis father point of view and how he felt. The conflict was well described and i like how the character in the...more
Lit Log for An Island Like You: Stories of the Barrio
By Judith Ortiz Cofer
It was a relief, a nice change, to read a book of short stories after reading novels. I liked how the stories stood by themselves, yet all intertwined and progressed through time. This leant a sense of continuity to the book. There also seemed to be a common thread running through all the characters. They all seemed to be wondering how they fit into the scheme of things and how to reconcile themselves with conflicting cul...more
By Judith Ortiz Cofer
It was a relief, a nice change, to read a book of short stories after reading novels. I liked how the stories stood by themselves, yet all intertwined and progressed through time. This leant a sense of continuity to the book. There also seemed to be a common thread running through all the characters. They all seemed to be wondering how they fit into the scheme of things and how to reconcile themselves with conflicting cul...more
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The main character luis was having problems with his life, his mother had died and he and his father both had issues because of that. He had recently been released because of him being caught breaking and entering. His father owned a junk yard where there were piles of cars. He worked at his fathers junk yard cleaning and polishing the hubcaps. One day a customer came in that he recognized from the funeral home where they had burried his mother. He spent the entire night breaking his cerfew look...more
The Book " Catching the moon" was a book that I thought was not completely good but a book that i enjoyed. The book starts off with a Young teenger who comes out of juvy early with a condition of doing community service in his father junk yard. The reason I liked the book was because the character Luis was portayed as a bad child, but before his mothers death he was shown as a kid that did not take his mother for granted. When his mother died he was unable to cope his feeling or express them in...more
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This novel is written in a personal favorite text structure of mine, a variety of narrators telling a common story. Cofer does just that with her collection of Puerto Rican-American teenagers sharing their stories about their neighborhood, cultural identity and how that fits together to create their individual identity. The setting of the novel comes alive as each individual discusses the importance, positive or negative, of the setting to their lives.
As a teacher I am constantly thinking about...more
As a teacher I am constantly thinking about...more
I thought that the short story "Catch The Moon" was awful. It did not have a very good ending. If a story has a terrible, then it pretty much is a terrible story overall because the ending is what is supposed to end the story, it reflects on the whole story. All that the ending was, was just Luis giving Naomi a hubcap. The story has no morals, no theme, no nothing. The only slight trace of a literary element this story has is symbolism (the hubcap), but what the hubcap symbolizes is very unclear...more
Cofer's related short stories of life in a Puerto Rican neighborhood in New Jersey are individually stellar. Each one is practically perfect. I enjoyed seeing characters recur through each other's eyes. Some are in first, some close third. There are many characters, however, and not one single thread that keeps a reader turning pages between stories. The final story would be cheesy in anyone else's hand, but in Cofer's, it worked. Themes: immigration, generations, sexuality, gender, violence, ar...more
I would recommend the short story "Catch the Moon." Throughout the whole story the author kept my hopes high to have accurate perdictions of the events that may have followed. The author used thorough description and dialogue to help us, readers, imagine the scenery. The hubcap deeply represents Luis because he becomes aware in his reflection of how much he has changed and sees the value of life with his modified ways. There is an internal conflict because he fails to notice to notice his wrong...more
And interesting interconnected set of short stories that could do with some fleshing out. Some of the stories are so short that it almost felt like the author threw them in there because they were on her computer/file drawer and she felt like they should be published. But the language was very lyrical and the last story "White Balloons" ended on a lovely upbeat note that I really liked. I can see why this won the awards that it did and teens should enjoy reading the collection no matter what cul...more
A compilation of short stories about 12 Puerto Rican children growing up in "El Building" in Paterson, New Jersey. I liked the simple honesty and simple writing about the difficulties of these children; however, I had difficulty identifying with the stories of many of the characters since the short story format did not lend itself to character development. I can see this being a good read for students who do have difficulty getting into reading because of the short story format and simple text s...more
Jun 11, 2011
Donna
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
latino-a_fiction_chapter-books
An Island Like You is a collection of short stories. Each story is centered around life in the Barrio. 12 individual stories, 12 scenarios, 12 voices but one central theme....life in the barrio. Bad Influence is told by Rita, who is sent to spend the summer with her Grandparents in Puerto Rico after she was xaught dating against her parent's wishes. Rita and her friend Meli told their parents that they wer spending the night at each ithers houses when in fact they wer spending the night with Joe...more
Oct 19, 2011
Kathleen Le
added it
I think the story "Catch the Moon" was one of the many great stories that I have read so far. It depicts the story and life of a troubled Puerto Rican teenager in the barrio. After he was released from juvie he had to do community service. His community service job was to work at his father's junkyard where he had to clean and polish the hubcaps. In this story, Judith Ortiz Cofer uses symbolism. For example, the hubcaps symbolize how the main character, Luis, has changed in nature from the begin...more
This is a collection of short stories about various Puerto Rican-American teenagers who live in the same tenement building in New Jersey. Their stories converge and diverge throughout the book, but each story stands alone. It is not necessary to read them all together. They're an easy read, and I would recommend them for use with reluctant freshmen readers, junior high, and maybe ESL 3. A lot of the stories are actually quite short and focus on a short period of time or just one event in the lif...more
I thought "Catch the Moon" by Judith Ortiz was a decent story. A symbol in the story was the hub cap that luis was trying to find for Niomi. The moon hub cap represented progression and change for luis. In the story luis felt that he had finally found some one who took interest in him and was willing to change for Niomi. I believe that the theme of the story is that without our loved ones we are lost and feel isolated. Luis began acting out, had gone to juvy, and stared a gang after his mother d...more
The short story "Catch the Moon" was not very appealing to me. The story of this boy named Luis was full of emotion at the beginning but in the end i did not really like the story. The story lacked a good ending and when i read books i look forword to suspenseful endings that leave you curious for more. The story had symbolism such as the moon which also appears in the ending where Luis shows it to a girl he likes.
This book has a alot of stories that are really nice. They all have a good message and trama. The one that i liked the most was the first story, because it is the type of gender I enjoy reading. it was about a girl that is punished by their parents because of something that she did with a guy; and its send to Puerto Ricowith her grandparents for summer vacations. There she makes a lot of friends and learns a lot of things.
This is a pretty great collection of short stories about teenagers of the barrio and told by teenagers of the barrio. Rita gets sent to PR to live with her grandparents for the summer as punishment for being caught with a boy. And then there is Arturo who starts his story: "Sometimes I just have to get out and walk. It's a real need with me. I guess it's one of the things that makes me odd in everyone's opinion." He doesnt' quite fit in with his classmates.
I really like that the book is short st...more
I really like that the book is short st...more
Judith Ortiz Cofer's book is a compilation of stories told from the perspective of Puerto Rican-American teenagers living in a Barrio in Paterson, New Jersey. There's Yolanda, loathing her mother's new boyfriend, and Rita, forced to spend a summer in Puerto Rico that she thinks will be the worst she's ever had. Then there's Rick, who is rejected by the neighborhood after coming out, and Kenny's REALLY bad drug experience. The interconnected characters share similarities in background, but couldn...more
this book is required for my class
omg wat can i said about this book
this book is just so amazing
and the last story was impressing
it was sweet and sad at the same time
i just couldn't seem to put the book down til i reach to the end of the book
but this book is really interesting for me to read
omg wat can i said about this book
this book is just so amazing
and the last story was impressing
it was sweet and sad at the same time
i just couldn't seem to put the book down til i reach to the end of the book
but this book is really interesting for me to read
I enjoyed Judith Ortiz-Cofer's An Island Like You because of the interwoven short stories. Several of the characters show up later in other character's narratives. I appreciated being able to see the characters both through their own and others' eyes.
Nov 07, 2012
Jennifer Wardrip
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
trt-posted-reviews
Reviewed by Kira M for TeensReadToo.com
Life in a Puerto Rican barrio has its ups and downs. The community is close-knit, but the money is scarce.
With bad influences in the forms of peers, pressure from boyfriends, and the loss of friends, things can get difficult. Each teen has their own way of dealing with things - and this is a book of their stories.
An eye-opening collection of short stories that doesn't put rose-colored glasses on the reality of at-risk teenagers. The stories are believable a...more
Life in a Puerto Rican barrio has its ups and downs. The community is close-knit, but the money is scarce.
With bad influences in the forms of peers, pressure from boyfriends, and the loss of friends, things can get difficult. Each teen has their own way of dealing with things - and this is a book of their stories.
An eye-opening collection of short stories that doesn't put rose-colored glasses on the reality of at-risk teenagers. The stories are believable a...more
I read this last year for one of my library school classes, and really loved it. Cofer is a beautiful writer, and her stories detailing the lives of teens in a Puerto Rican barrio are vivid and sad.
I got extra enjoyment out of these interconnected short stories because of my own stint in the Caribbean. Really strong, funny and/or moving stories, and I love the way they twine together.
Read for 8th grade English class. It wasn't bad. It just wasn't my kind of book. The only character I particularly liked was the guy who liked poetry. I forgot his name. Adam?
This is a collection of stories about different kids in a poor, latino neighborhood. Even though they all have separate lives, they're connected in important ways.
Jan 31, 2012
Carmela
added it
Read this a long time ago but wanted to record the title for future reference. Date read is a wild guess.
Twelve stories, loosely intertwined, examine the lives of teenagers who live in a New Jersey Puerto Rican barrio.
All twelve stories deal with different facts of life, told from the perspective of teenagers struggling to create a cultural identity for themselves. There are stories of loss, relationships, drugs, familial issues, and sexuality. The stories were told in the first and third person, but it was very difficult to discern who was speaking. Sometimes you never know the name of the narrato...more
All twelve stories deal with different facts of life, told from the perspective of teenagers struggling to create a cultural identity for themselves. There are stories of loss, relationships, drugs, familial issues, and sexuality. The stories were told in the first and third person, but it was very difficult to discern who was speaking. Sometimes you never know the name of the narrato...more
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Judith Ortiz Cofer is a native of Puerto Rico. She is a poet, essayist, and novelist whose most recent book for young readers is Call Me Maria: A Novel in Letters, Poems, and Prose. She is the Regents and Franklin Professor of English and Creative Writing at the University of Georgia.
More about Judith Ortiz Cofer...
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