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When They Call You a Terrorist (Young Adult Edition): A Story of Black Lives Matter and the Power to Change the World
Patrisse Khan-Cullors' and asha bandele's instant New York Times bestseller, When They Call You a Terrorist is now adapted for the YA audience with photos and journal entries!
A movement that started with a hashtag--#BlackLivesMatter--on Twitter spread across the nation and then across the world.
From one of the co-founders of the Black Lives Matter movement comes a poetic memoir and reflection on humanity. Necessary and timely, Patrisse Khan-Cullors' story asks us to remember that protest in the interest of the most vulnerable comes from love. Leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement have been called terrorists, a threat to America. But in truth, they are loving women whose life experiences have led them to seek justice for those victimized by the powerful.
In this meaningful, empowering account of survival, strength, and resilience, Cullors and asha bandele seek to change the culture that declares innocent black life expendable.
A movement that started with a hashtag--#BlackLivesMatter--on Twitter spread across the nation and then across the world.
From one of the co-founders of the Black Lives Matter movement comes a poetic memoir and reflection on humanity. Necessary and timely, Patrisse Khan-Cullors' story asks us to remember that protest in the interest of the most vulnerable comes from love. Leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement have been called terrorists, a threat to America. But in truth, they are loving women whose life experiences have led them to seek justice for those victimized by the powerful.
In this meaningful, empowering account of survival, strength, and resilience, Cullors and asha bandele seek to change the culture that declares innocent black life expendable.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published September 29, 2020
48 people are currently reading
962 people want to read
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November 2, 2020
With every racial justice book I read, I usually state how incredibly important the book is. WHEN THEY CALL YOU A TERRORIST is no exception. Could it be the single most important book I have read in the fight to save Black lives? Quite possibly. Patrisse Khan-Cullors, one of the co-founders of the Black Lives Matter movement, tells you her story and how BLM began. From being raised by her mother, a Jehovah’s Witness, to meeting her birth father for the first time, to defining her sexual identity, her brother’s unjust arrests and inhumane treatment while incarcerated several times... this young adult book inspires all of us to take part in a movement to save, protect and raise up Black Lives. Never has a book been more important to read right now. But don’t just read it. Do something. Join the movement. Fight for justice and equity for Black Lives now.
Here are my favorite quotes. Please excuse any mistakes, as I listened to the audiobook and did not have the printed text to check for accuracy.
“How is it possible that the only response we have for poor people who are mentally ill is criminalization?”
“Is this what it is to be a mother who has to carry the weight of trying to protect her children in world that is trying to kill them?”
“Nothing can break a community united, a community guided by love.”
“Later when I hear others dismissing our voices, our protests for equity by saying all lives matter, or blue lives matter, I will wonder how many white Americans are dragged out of their bed in the middle of the night because they might fit a vague description offered up by God knows who.”
“There are people close to us who are worried that the very term Black Lives Matter is too radical to use, alienating, even as we are all standing in the blood of Black children and adults.”
Thank you to Libro.fm for providing an ALC. #LitReviewCrew
Here are my favorite quotes. Please excuse any mistakes, as I listened to the audiobook and did not have the printed text to check for accuracy.
“How is it possible that the only response we have for poor people who are mentally ill is criminalization?”
“Is this what it is to be a mother who has to carry the weight of trying to protect her children in world that is trying to kill them?”
“Nothing can break a community united, a community guided by love.”
“Later when I hear others dismissing our voices, our protests for equity by saying all lives matter, or blue lives matter, I will wonder how many white Americans are dragged out of their bed in the middle of the night because they might fit a vague description offered up by God knows who.”
“There are people close to us who are worried that the very term Black Lives Matter is too radical to use, alienating, even as we are all standing in the blood of Black children and adults.”
Thank you to Libro.fm for providing an ALC. #LitReviewCrew
September 27, 2023
"Close your eyes and come close, try to imagine this with me. You are graduate student whose work is in Chinese medicine. Your dream is to be a healer. And maybe, while you are sleeping in your wife's bed, which is in a cottage that's part of a cooperative village, where artists live and children come for free painting classes, maybe you are dreaming that you are saving a life, and in the midst of that dreaming, you are yanked out of bed by armed men, dressed in riot gear who possess no warrant, who have snuck into your bedroom through an unlocked back door. Their only reasoning is that you fit the description. And who exactly gave that description? What other proof did they have? How did they know you were even sleeping in that bed, since the cottage is not in your name but your wife's? How is this different from tactics used by the SS, the KGB, the Tonton Macoute? And who is the real criminal, the real terrorist? And how will they will be held accountable? To this day, the stench of these questions lingers, the stench of rotting meat unaddressed, unanswered."
4.5 stars.
Khan-Cullors' story is really moving and inspiring. She takes us through a life of trauma and fear, but also of resilience, love, and community in which people truly support one another. She encourages us to imagine a better world and fight for it. I would have liked to know more about how certain initiatives she fought for panned out. For example, I think she got a civilian oversight board instated to look over the sheriff's department. I'd like to have known more about that organization's success, how prisoners report issues and how they are subsequently addressed, etc. I also would have liked to hear some statistics about the positive impact of marijuana legalization, for example how many charges were dropped and prisoners freed with that new legislation.
For negatives, I'd say Khan-Cullors repeated herself a bit, which I really hate when nonfiction books do that, it's like they think I wasn't paying attention the first time. I understand she may have been repeating facts to emphasize them but it was really just the exact same thing twice. The listener/reader questions didn't always feel aligned well with the chapters. The quotes (and I guess journal entries? Didn't know that was part of the book until reading the description on Goodreads just now) were interpersed with the text and difficult to follow in audio format.
I listened to the audiobook, Khan-Cullors read pretty well. The recording quality wasn't great for Angela Davis' foreword but it was understandable.
I hope this will be required reading in schools and highly recommend it.
Quotes (formatting/quoting may be off, since I am transcribing from the audiobook):
"There are more people with mental health disorders in prison than in all of the psychiatric hospitals in the United States added up. In 2015, the Washington Post reported that American prisons and jails house an estimated 356,268 people with severe mental illness, a figure that is more than 10 times the number of mentally ill patients in state psychiatric hospitals in 2012, the last year for reliable data, about 35,000 people."
"I call an ambulance and do a mini intake over the phone, but they will not come to help when they hear [my brother's] background.
'He is a felon?' They say. 'You have to call the police.'
I beg, 'Please help us. This isn't a criminal matter.'
They refuse. They disconnect the line. My mother and I go back and forth and decide we have no other choice. Distraught, I call the local law enforcement office, one of the most difficult calls I've ever had to make, and explain everything.
I beg them to go slow. I tell them Monty's history with police because by now I know he was beaten and tortured by LA County sheriffs.
Two rookies arrive and they are young as fuck. I meet them downstairs. I ask them, 'What will you do if my brother gets violent? Monty's never been violent, but I'm trying to prepare for anything. I'm --we're-- in a place we've never been.'
'We'll just taser him,' one responds.
'No! My god, absolutely not!' I refuse to let them pass me until they promise me they won't hurt him, and when they finally do I lead them into the apartment, explaining to Monty as I walk through the door, 'It's okay, it's okay, they're just here to help.'
And my brother, my big, loving, unwell, good-hearted brother, my brother who has rescued small animals and my brother who has never, never hurt another human being, drops to his knees and begins to cry. His hands are in the air and he is sobbing. 'Please don't take me back, please don't take me back.'"
"'I remember how being young and Black and gay and lonely felt. A lot of it was fine, feeling I had the truth and the light and the key. A lot of it was purely hell.' -Audre Lorde"
"But a week into his very first paid position, [Monty] was promptly fired. His background check had come back. ...[The words here are not perfectly clear to me], get the hell out. We tried pulling him closer to us, and my mother begged him to live with her, risking her Section 8 status. If you have government housing benefits, you cannot have anyone living with you if they've been convicted of a crime, even if they are a juvenile and even if they are incapable of caring for themselves because of an illness, and even if they cannot get a job because even the most low-level jobs won't hire someone with a conviction. In California, there are more than 4800 barriers to re-entry, from jobs, housing, and food bans, to school financial aid bans, and the list goes on. You can have a 2 year sentence, but it does not mean you're not doing life."
"Two days later, Monty is transferred to Twin Towers as a high-power alert prisoner, which means he is classified as a threat to officers. To hear this is complete cognitive fucking dissonance. My brother has never hurt another living being, let alone a cop. But he has been stripped, beaten, and starved, kicked, and humiliated by cops. So they get to call him the threat. They get to call him the harm. They get to charge him with terrorism.
Incarcerated as a high-power alert prisoner, Monty is kept in his cell 23 hours a day, in solitary confinement, a condition that has long been proven to insitigate mental illness in those who previously had been mentally stable. In my brother's case, he deteriorates quickly, predictably, horribly, and without a singly doctor on that staff to assert the oath -- First, do no harm."
"When I go to Twin Towers for the first time to visit my brother, he makes the plea again.
'I don't feel well, Trisse. Could I please have my meds? They give me Advil, but I need my meds. Please, Trisse, please.'
His voice, the look in his eyes, breaks my heart. I wonder if heart meds are withheld from people, cancer meds, and asthma pumps. We know Hep C treatments are. And Naloxone, which can reverse an OD, has been. We certainly know meds that would slow the onset of AIDS have been kept out of reach of certain groups of people. What kind of society uses medicine as a weapon, keeps it from people needing to heal, all the while continuing to develop the drugs America's prisons use to execute people?"
"How is it possible that the only response we have for poor people who are mentally ill is criminalization? How does this align with the notion of a democratic or free society, to not take care of the least of these?"
"I accept this, that my mother is leaving. But I cannot help think that the drug war, the war on gangs, has really been no more than a forced migration project. From my neighborhood in LA to the Bay Area to Brooklyn, Black and brown people have been moved out as young white people build exciting new lives standing on the bones of ours. The drug war as ethnic cleansing."
"'Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who are oppressing them.' - Assata Shakur"
"...but like the horrific history of lynching in this country, when the story is told, women are often left out of it, even as we are lynched, too."
4.5 stars.
Khan-Cullors' story is really moving and inspiring. She takes us through a life of trauma and fear, but also of resilience, love, and community in which people truly support one another. She encourages us to imagine a better world and fight for it. I would have liked to know more about how certain initiatives she fought for panned out. For example, I think she got a civilian oversight board instated to look over the sheriff's department. I'd like to have known more about that organization's success, how prisoners report issues and how they are subsequently addressed, etc. I also would have liked to hear some statistics about the positive impact of marijuana legalization, for example how many charges were dropped and prisoners freed with that new legislation.
For negatives, I'd say Khan-Cullors repeated herself a bit, which I really hate when nonfiction books do that, it's like they think I wasn't paying attention the first time. I understand she may have been repeating facts to emphasize them but it was really just the exact same thing twice. The listener/reader questions didn't always feel aligned well with the chapters. The quotes (and I guess journal entries? Didn't know that was part of the book until reading the description on Goodreads just now) were interpersed with the text and difficult to follow in audio format.
I listened to the audiobook, Khan-Cullors read pretty well. The recording quality wasn't great for Angela Davis' foreword but it was understandable.
I hope this will be required reading in schools and highly recommend it.
Quotes (formatting/quoting may be off, since I am transcribing from the audiobook):
"There are more people with mental health disorders in prison than in all of the psychiatric hospitals in the United States added up. In 2015, the Washington Post reported that American prisons and jails house an estimated 356,268 people with severe mental illness, a figure that is more than 10 times the number of mentally ill patients in state psychiatric hospitals in 2012, the last year for reliable data, about 35,000 people."
"I call an ambulance and do a mini intake over the phone, but they will not come to help when they hear [my brother's] background.
'He is a felon?' They say. 'You have to call the police.'
I beg, 'Please help us. This isn't a criminal matter.'
They refuse. They disconnect the line. My mother and I go back and forth and decide we have no other choice. Distraught, I call the local law enforcement office, one of the most difficult calls I've ever had to make, and explain everything.
I beg them to go slow. I tell them Monty's history with police because by now I know he was beaten and tortured by LA County sheriffs.
Two rookies arrive and they are young as fuck. I meet them downstairs. I ask them, 'What will you do if my brother gets violent? Monty's never been violent, but I'm trying to prepare for anything. I'm --we're-- in a place we've never been.'
'We'll just taser him,' one responds.
'No! My god, absolutely not!' I refuse to let them pass me until they promise me they won't hurt him, and when they finally do I lead them into the apartment, explaining to Monty as I walk through the door, 'It's okay, it's okay, they're just here to help.'
And my brother, my big, loving, unwell, good-hearted brother, my brother who has rescued small animals and my brother who has never, never hurt another human being, drops to his knees and begins to cry. His hands are in the air and he is sobbing. 'Please don't take me back, please don't take me back.'"
"'I remember how being young and Black and gay and lonely felt. A lot of it was fine, feeling I had the truth and the light and the key. A lot of it was purely hell.' -Audre Lorde"
"But a week into his very first paid position, [Monty] was promptly fired. His background check had come back. ...[The words here are not perfectly clear to me], get the hell out. We tried pulling him closer to us, and my mother begged him to live with her, risking her Section 8 status. If you have government housing benefits, you cannot have anyone living with you if they've been convicted of a crime, even if they are a juvenile and even if they are incapable of caring for themselves because of an illness, and even if they cannot get a job because even the most low-level jobs won't hire someone with a conviction. In California, there are more than 4800 barriers to re-entry, from jobs, housing, and food bans, to school financial aid bans, and the list goes on. You can have a 2 year sentence, but it does not mean you're not doing life."
"Two days later, Monty is transferred to Twin Towers as a high-power alert prisoner, which means he is classified as a threat to officers. To hear this is complete cognitive fucking dissonance. My brother has never hurt another living being, let alone a cop. But he has been stripped, beaten, and starved, kicked, and humiliated by cops. So they get to call him the threat. They get to call him the harm. They get to charge him with terrorism.
Incarcerated as a high-power alert prisoner, Monty is kept in his cell 23 hours a day, in solitary confinement, a condition that has long been proven to insitigate mental illness in those who previously had been mentally stable. In my brother's case, he deteriorates quickly, predictably, horribly, and without a singly doctor on that staff to assert the oath -- First, do no harm."
"When I go to Twin Towers for the first time to visit my brother, he makes the plea again.
'I don't feel well, Trisse. Could I please have my meds? They give me Advil, but I need my meds. Please, Trisse, please.'
His voice, the look in his eyes, breaks my heart. I wonder if heart meds are withheld from people, cancer meds, and asthma pumps. We know Hep C treatments are. And Naloxone, which can reverse an OD, has been. We certainly know meds that would slow the onset of AIDS have been kept out of reach of certain groups of people. What kind of society uses medicine as a weapon, keeps it from people needing to heal, all the while continuing to develop the drugs America's prisons use to execute people?"
"How is it possible that the only response we have for poor people who are mentally ill is criminalization? How does this align with the notion of a democratic or free society, to not take care of the least of these?"
"I accept this, that my mother is leaving. But I cannot help think that the drug war, the war on gangs, has really been no more than a forced migration project. From my neighborhood in LA to the Bay Area to Brooklyn, Black and brown people have been moved out as young white people build exciting new lives standing on the bones of ours. The drug war as ethnic cleansing."
"'Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who are oppressing them.' - Assata Shakur"
"...but like the horrific history of lynching in this country, when the story is told, women are often left out of it, even as we are lynched, too."
February 11, 2022
Going through the list of the books for continued reading in What is Black Lives Matter, this one interested me. This was fantastic.
I read the one adapted for young readers. I wasn't sure if this means it was abridged but as soon as I was reading it felt very much like nothing was cut out and was written for the masses. The only thing that stood out was the reader questions after each chapter, I assume to help younger readers be prompted into thinking about the finer details and form thoughts on the topics discussed. I thought this was fantastic and actually helps with regular reviewing and criticing of society as well as being a handy tool for what to include in book reviews, so you may see parts of my review following some of these prompts.
Learning about Monte damn near broke my heart. Not only was I feeling for his family but to imagine just a fraction of what he had been put through, and at his most vulnerable, is inconceivable. I had experienced loss in a slightly similar way with their first father walking out of the children's lives. I think I held onto a lot of anger that I worked through on my own as I took in the world around me, and later, slightly in therapy. My mother was a continuous strength for me, always, and so when she passed away too soon that was the loss that left me heartbroken and devastated. I most definitely haven't rebounded from this loss, but I am learning to live with it. Although Patrisse and her family didn't really "do" emotions, I'm glad she had their strength to rely on during her hardships. I'm also thankful she was able to surround herself in love through her friends.
This was incredibly powerful, moving and inspiring and to read about all the individuals to have played a part was awe inspiring.
I think it would have been nice to have captions under the photos to get a sense of who everyone was and at times I'd be a bit confused at placing as we jumped back and fourth in events that happened across time. But these are all minor things that urged me slightly, in the flow of reading.
My answers for the more specific questions:
I personally grew up in a predominantly all white neighbourhood and I think I'm one of the "lucky" ones in that I've never really faced rascim from that community growing up or from outside.
Police were around but it wasn't very obvious, from what I recall. Despite being a good child, there has always been something deep rooted in me that coils in fear at the police. Its that cease up, that tension of knowing I've done nothing wrong, yet the body is so anxious it may as well scream "arrest me". Maybe it's a learned behaviour wired in our DNA. How sad is that?
Pick it up, give it a go and enjoy! >(^_^)<
Gén
I read the one adapted for young readers. I wasn't sure if this means it was abridged but as soon as I was reading it felt very much like nothing was cut out and was written for the masses. The only thing that stood out was the reader questions after each chapter, I assume to help younger readers be prompted into thinking about the finer details and form thoughts on the topics discussed. I thought this was fantastic and actually helps with regular reviewing and criticing of society as well as being a handy tool for what to include in book reviews, so you may see parts of my review following some of these prompts.
Learning about Monte damn near broke my heart. Not only was I feeling for his family but to imagine just a fraction of what he had been put through, and at his most vulnerable, is inconceivable. I had experienced loss in a slightly similar way with their first father walking out of the children's lives. I think I held onto a lot of anger that I worked through on my own as I took in the world around me, and later, slightly in therapy. My mother was a continuous strength for me, always, and so when she passed away too soon that was the loss that left me heartbroken and devastated. I most definitely haven't rebounded from this loss, but I am learning to live with it. Although Patrisse and her family didn't really "do" emotions, I'm glad she had their strength to rely on during her hardships. I'm also thankful she was able to surround herself in love through her friends.
This was incredibly powerful, moving and inspiring and to read about all the individuals to have played a part was awe inspiring.
I think it would have been nice to have captions under the photos to get a sense of who everyone was and at times I'd be a bit confused at placing as we jumped back and fourth in events that happened across time. But these are all minor things that urged me slightly, in the flow of reading.
My answers for the more specific questions:
I personally grew up in a predominantly all white neighbourhood and I think I'm one of the "lucky" ones in that I've never really faced rascim from that community growing up or from outside.
Police were around but it wasn't very obvious, from what I recall. Despite being a good child, there has always been something deep rooted in me that coils in fear at the police. Its that cease up, that tension of knowing I've done nothing wrong, yet the body is so anxious it may as well scream "arrest me". Maybe it's a learned behaviour wired in our DNA. How sad is that?
Pick it up, give it a go and enjoy! >(^_^)<
Gén
October 8, 2025
i said this at the last memoir sort of book I read, and that is I never know how to rate memoirs, cause I can't rate them like any other book because they tell real stories.
On the story aspect of this, it could be improved. It felt like it didn't have much of a story structure that made sense, and I was often confused.
as a life story though, it was crazy. the amount of stuff one girl had to go through, things that were completely out of her control is crazy. I can't imagine living a life where it feels like everything I do is a failure in societies eyes, and I like that she spoke her perspective on black lives matter and how she brought it around because it got a lot of controversy on the media.
On the story aspect of this, it could be improved. It felt like it didn't have much of a story structure that made sense, and I was often confused.
as a life story though, it was crazy. the amount of stuff one girl had to go through, things that were completely out of her control is crazy. I can't imagine living a life where it feels like everything I do is a failure in societies eyes, and I like that she spoke her perspective on black lives matter and how she brought it around because it got a lot of controversy on the media.
April 9, 2023
Hundreds more Librarian's Perspective Reviews like this one at MrsReaderPants.
When They Call You a Terrorist is a memoir by Patrisse Cullers, one of the three cofounders of the Black Lives Matter movement. I read the Young Adult Edition, which I think should be required reading in all high schools. The book isn’t always riveting, but the ideas behind it are so important for our next generation to internalize.
WHAT I LIKED
I’ve already said it twice, but I’ll say it once more for those in the back. When They Call You a Terrorist is critical reading for all high school students and adults. There are two versions: one for adults and one for young adults. This review is for the YA version.
Sadly, too many members of my generation (Gen X) and my parents’ generation (Boomers) seem to be a lost cause when it comes to prejudice and racism in the US. By requiring books like When They Call You a Terrorist in high school courses, we can hopefully raise our children to do better. Unfortunately, there is currently a lot of pushback in US schools about the perceived teaching of “critical race theory.”
Because of this pushback, there will be schools and teachers that choose not to teach books that confront racism head-on. As a teacher and school librarian, I can tell you that many of us fear very real social, employment, and legal consequences. Some states, such as Florida, have actually passed laws prohibiting books like When They Call You a Terrorist from being taught in schools. We have such a terribly long way to go, and it seems some areas are even going backward.
For many young people, educating themselves will be the only way they will know and understand the civil rights issues our citizens face. It’s too bad that the people who most need to read books like When They Call You a Terrorist probably won’t ever read them. They will instead choose to keep their minds closed and continue to blame Black people (and poor people and mentally ill people) for their own situations. They will never see how society and our government don’t bother to address social problems in any real way; I would argue that our social, economic, and legal systems actually make these problems worse.
The parts of the book that I found most interesting are the sections dealing with Cullors’ male family members’ brushes with police. Her brother Monte has schizo-affective disorder. When medicated properly, Monte is able to function normally in society. He can and does hold down a job. But when he goes to prison, he is abused and terrorized. When he is finally released from prison, Monte is just let go, without any concern for his mental state at the time.
I also liked the section near the end about Trump’s election and the victories and drawbacks of the BLM movement. This is a saga that will continue to unfold with the 2024 presidential election. I’m once again ever-thankful that I’ve chosen to live outside the US since 2014, but that doesn’t make our country’s problems any easier to watch.
I liked the reader questions at the end of each chapter. From reading Goodreads reviews of both versions, it seems that the reader discussion questions are only in the YA version.
WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE
Overall, the book was mostly interesting and kept my focus pretty well. I was less interested in the more personal aspects of Cullors’ life, such as her romantic relationships. I also had trouble keeping up with various names of friends and colleagues, which were mentioned regularly, especially in the second half.
Both the YA version and adult version have exactly 272 pages, which makes me wonder how different the two versions actually are. The audiobook versions are almost the same length as well.
AUDIOBOOK QUALITY
The YA version audiobook is 6 hours and 51 minutes long. The adult version is similar in length. Both are narrated by the author, Patrisse Cullors, with a short foreword by Angela Davis.
While I was mostly focused for the audiobook narration, I did feel the narration was too monotone, like Cullors was bored or tired of reading it. The story is NOT boring, and I wish Cullors had channeled more emotion into her reading.
It’s yet another instance of an author-narrated audiobook that fell short of amazing.
I’ve said this so many times. While there are a few exceptions – Jason Reynolds, Kwame Alexander, Trevor Noah – generally, authors should leave audiobook narration to professional voice actors. Their books will be all the more powerful for it.
DIVERSITY
All major characters are real African American people.
ARTWORK/ILLUSTRATIONS
The YA print version includes photographs, but since I read the audiobook, I did not see them.
THEMES
#BlackLivesMatter, social problems, racism, discrimination, mental illness, police brutality, prison industrial complex, incarceration of Black males, parent in prison (father), sibling in prison (brother), political activism, LGBT, gender-nonconforming
LIBRARIANS WILL WANT TO KNOW
Would adults like this book? YES, very important reading for all adults
Would I buy this for my high school library? YES, very important reading for all high school students
Would I buy this for my middle school library? MAYBE. There is nothing in it content-wise that middle schoolers couldn’t handle. Rather, I think the content engagement will depend on the student. I know eighth graders who would love this book, but most sixth graders won’t have enough life experience to truly understand the context.
Would I buy this for my elementary school library? NO – It’s definitely not an elementary book.
MATURE CONTENT
Language: I don’t remember any profanity, but audiobooks are difficult to remember specific language. It mature language is in there, it isn’t gratuitous.
Sexuality: very mild; sex is mentioned but not described.
Violence: high; police violence and racism; mention of several real cases of Black people who died in police custody
Drugs/Alcohol: mild; mention of marijuana
Other: Patrisse is bisexual; some people are gender-nonconforming
April 11, 2021
There are some parts that really made my heart ached. I could tell the author wrote with lots of emotional, passion, and love for her family and her community. This is a great book for anyone interested in social justice organizations, but it just wasn't for me. I really did not enjoy the flow of the story, making it difficult to follow since it was not in a chronological order. Don't get me wrong, there are people who I would recommend this book to, the writing style just wasn't for me.
April 21, 2021
I read the YA version by mistake (got it from the library and just didn't notice the edition) but I wonder how the adult version is different so I may check that one out, too. Really good book!
January 1, 2021
Wow. Just wow. They say some books are mirrors and some are windows. This memoir is certainly a window for me as I have little to no shared experiences with Patrisse Kahn-Cullors.
Patrisse Kahn-Cullors bears it all as she tells her life story and the ultimate creation of #BlackLivesMatter. Single parent childhood, living in poverty, a jailhouse father, witnessing arrests of siblings and friends, a brother with mental health issues, sexual identity...all this and much more is shared in great detail. The audio version is passionately narrated by the author and is sometimes a gut punch.
As a white individual, who was raised in a predominantly white community in the Deep South, I know my life experiences are different from many in neighboring communities. By reading this book I now have greater insight as to just how different life is for many individuals.
During the last several months there has been much debate (on social media) about Black Lives Matter vs. All Lives Matter vs. Police Lives Matter. The disparity in education opportunities, income equality, social class, medical care, and incarceration rates is statistically proven for black Americans. We must do better and activists like Patrisse are hard at work but we must join their ranks and fight the good fight. I realize this looks different for every person. At the moment for me it’s reading, listening, and being more cognizant about what’s happening near me. Others may be further along and actively involved in making change. If so, I applaud you.
Warning: The F-bomb is prolific throughout the book. If you are sensitive to that you may want to consider the print version as opposed to the audio version.
Thank you Libro.fm for this ALC. I bookmarked several excepts that I think I will want to refer to in the future.
Patrisse Kahn-Cullors bears it all as she tells her life story and the ultimate creation of #BlackLivesMatter. Single parent childhood, living in poverty, a jailhouse father, witnessing arrests of siblings and friends, a brother with mental health issues, sexual identity...all this and much more is shared in great detail. The audio version is passionately narrated by the author and is sometimes a gut punch.
As a white individual, who was raised in a predominantly white community in the Deep South, I know my life experiences are different from many in neighboring communities. By reading this book I now have greater insight as to just how different life is for many individuals.
During the last several months there has been much debate (on social media) about Black Lives Matter vs. All Lives Matter vs. Police Lives Matter. The disparity in education opportunities, income equality, social class, medical care, and incarceration rates is statistically proven for black Americans. We must do better and activists like Patrisse are hard at work but we must join their ranks and fight the good fight. I realize this looks different for every person. At the moment for me it’s reading, listening, and being more cognizant about what’s happening near me. Others may be further along and actively involved in making change. If so, I applaud you.
Warning: The F-bomb is prolific throughout the book. If you are sensitive to that you may want to consider the print version as opposed to the audio version.
Thank you Libro.fm for this ALC. I bookmarked several excepts that I think I will want to refer to in the future.
November 10, 2020
Belletrist YA Pick for #WhyNotYA November.
“We, the people.
We are not terrorists.
I am not a terrorist.
I am Patrisse Marie Khan-Cullors Brignac.
I am a survivor.
I am stardust.”
When They Call You a Terrorist is a moving memoir on how discriminated the black community has always been. Eventhough in America segregration has been long gone, racism is still something that exists and happens to POC especially black people on a daily. To read Patrisse’s story as a kid to how she co-founded an empowering movement is very eye-opening and moving. It gives you a sense of realization on how important this movement is, on how so many injustice towards POC and black people had been happening all this time and how this is the moment, the time, for all of you to fight back against this unfair discrimination.
“You, each one, are endowed with gifts you don’t even yet know, and you, each one, are what love and the possibility of a world in which our lives truly matter looks like.”
One of the most moving memoir I’ve read this year. Definitely a must read for anyone interested in the BLM movement. If you could join the movement, do it. Fight for your rights. This is the time.
“We, the people.
We are not terrorists.
I am not a terrorist.
I am Patrisse Marie Khan-Cullors Brignac.
I am a survivor.
I am stardust.”
When They Call You a Terrorist is a moving memoir on how discriminated the black community has always been. Eventhough in America segregration has been long gone, racism is still something that exists and happens to POC especially black people on a daily. To read Patrisse’s story as a kid to how she co-founded an empowering movement is very eye-opening and moving. It gives you a sense of realization on how important this movement is, on how so many injustice towards POC and black people had been happening all this time and how this is the moment, the time, for all of you to fight back against this unfair discrimination.
“You, each one, are endowed with gifts you don’t even yet know, and you, each one, are what love and the possibility of a world in which our lives truly matter looks like.”
One of the most moving memoir I’ve read this year. Definitely a must read for anyone interested in the BLM movement. If you could join the movement, do it. Fight for your rights. This is the time.
November 7, 2020
This was so beautiful. Patrisse Khan-Cullors is an amazing storyteller, and she lays out her life story in such an engaging, vulnerable, and emotional way. She connects the case for #BlackLivesMatter to her own life so lovingly; she focuses it on healing, community, collective action, and love while explicitly and expertly calling out the unfair and unjust police practices and legal systems in our country. I wish everyone would read this book, and I think the young adult adaptation was so well done with the reader questions, little asides, and well-chosen photos. I was particularly inclined to love this specific memoir because of all the amazing 90s references/quotes :)
December 7, 2020
such a good and important book! if you have a loved one experiencing mental illness and/or incarceration, just be aware -- this is one of the most accurate descriptions of how traumatizing and awful that experience is. the way the author describes how helpless and silenced and violated we all feel is so spot-on, and it will break your heart all over again. but i am still very thankful to have read this book. and i hope it will make people more empathetic about what we and our loved ones endure.
April 10, 2021
Perhaps it’s because I read an ebook copy, but the quotes were in such a tiny font I had to squint to read them. They also seemed to be interspersed within the larger text quite randomly. I was also very disappointed that no captions were included with the many photos. Strong work with an important message, but these formatting issues detracted from my overall enjoyment, and I think would that of teens as well. Looking forward to reading the adult version to compare how it was adapted.
October 31, 2020
6 stars. The addition of pictures, interspersed personal notes, and discussion questions after each chapter are so additive to the YA version. Her perspective and framing of her own story, making it present tense and always talking about structural issues, is so vital. Bought a book set, hoping to work with teachers and students for lit circles and book groups with this!
July 11, 2023
A necessary read to understand the BLM movement. Terrorist is the new Communist. It gives license to authorities to do whatever they want to dominated people who are sick of being treated like they don’t matter. I’m so glad I read this book!
October 15, 2020
I may have finished this book but I’m not done reading, evaluating, learning. I have a feeling this book will be sitting with me for a long time after turning that last page. My heart is heavy.
November 3, 2020
A must read. Read it.
Read
November 4, 2020Riveting, provocative and informative. Finished listening on election night, hopeful but worried about our democracy.
March 5, 2021
This book was hard to read but is an extremely good read. Hearing these stories is hard, I was in tears for many different parts. I’m really glad I picked up this book.
February 16, 2021
AMAZING book!!! I can already think of a list of students I’d like to buy this book for.
April 12, 2021
Hypocrite!
March 9, 2022
Patrisse Khan-Cullors is one of the three founders of the Black Lives Matter movement, and this is her memoir. She begins with her childhood, growing up in a heavily-policed neighborhood in California that had poorly-funded schools. Her mother had to work multiple jobs, and her family was constantly subjected to racial profiling. Patrisse was closest with her older brother Monte, who ends up in prison multiple times for trivial matters. He is abused and neglected while there, both of which contribute to the severity of his mental illness. Meanwhile, Patrisse shares her dedication to her academics, which earned her a spot in a gifted school, as well as her exploration of her sexuality. But she never forgets what her brother, and other Black friends and family, have gone through at the hands of police. Patrisse’s experiences push her to create the Black Lives Matter hashtag with Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi. Though hashtag grows into a movement, Patrisse ends with reminding readers/listeners that there is still so much more work to be done.
I listened to the audiobook for this one, since Patrisse narrates herself; however, the book includes photos and powerful quotes from activists that inspired her.
I listened to the audiobook for this one, since Patrisse narrates herself; however, the book includes photos and powerful quotes from activists that inspired her.
October 21, 2022
In the news worldwide there has been much talk about the Black Lives Matter movement. However, rarely do we hear anything other than peoples opinions. In this novel, we get to hear straight from one of the creators mouths. She talks not only about the movement that we know today, but the path of her life to see how she got to this moment. Furthermore, in the teen edition, she also asks thought provoking questions that makes readers step out of their own shoes and into the lives of those around them. It is an interesting depiction of her own life and what she went through to this moment in time. It was for once nice to hear her own words and not those of others who warp things for their own agenda!!
December 30, 2022
I've been listening to this audiobook via the free audiobooks for educators on Libro.fm and Patrisse narrates her journey to becoming a founding activist for BLM. She shares her family's story, especially society's horrific treatment of her brother and father and intersperses statistics, facts and listener's reflection questions in this memoir. It's an engaging and compelling story that young people can relate to.
April 12, 2022
Overall a very informative book about the BLM movement. I sometimes felt like a bit of the information was out of order/didn’t make sense in the order it was written but other than that it was a good read.
September 30, 2023
Really enjoyed the YA version of this book. This is Patrisse Cullors' powerful memoir about growing up in LA in the 90's (think war on drugs, Baca's prisoner abuse scandal, LA riots, etc. ) and how she came to start the #Blacklivesmatter movement.
December 12, 2024
This is the epitome of what “ethnic studies” is. A narrative of intersectional (race/class/gender/sexuality/ability/etc) experiences that leads to call to actions. I’d highly consider using this as a core text if I taught an intro to ethnic studies class.
March 24, 2023
realized I was reading the YA version haha but this was so well written and informative
March 31, 2024
Amazing book I don’t usually read memoirs but this one was amazing
December 15, 2024
The shocking reason for the initiation of the BLM organisation by a group of black women in the US demanding justice. Read it and weep.
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