Cheap Growing Up Fast (Book) (Joanna Lipper) Price

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Customer Reviews of Growing Up Fast

Growing Up Fast provides a window into the lives of those girls we see pushing baby strollers along a downtown sidewalk, laying out the challenging truths that led them to become mothers, and that they continue to confront as they raise their children. The "bleak story" is not just for the six teen mothers profiled in this book, but for American children, ill-prepared or uncaring young fathers, extended families, schools, taxpayers and all of us who care about America's next generations.

I have just finished reading Random Family, by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, which has to be the publishing world's equivalent of a first cousin for Growing Up Fast. I highly recommend both books, but I came to appreciate Lipper's approach in dividing her narrative into six stories. Although some stories are related, no chapter is so long and complex that one becomes overwhelmed with names and relationships and timelines. The diversity achieved by profiling six girls also allows Lipper to avoid the question, "Why Coco?" that LeBlanc notes was posed to her repeatedly about her decision to focus on one of the two principal subjects of Random Family. Lipper also provides beautiful photos that allow us to look right into the haunted eyes (as well as some moments of contentment) of these young families.

I am the Mayor of Pittsfield. Before publication of Growing Up Fast, I worried how Lipper's book would portray our City. Lipper is successful in telling the story through the words and experiences of Amy, Liz, Colleen, Shayla, Sheri and Jessica, and avoids injecting judgments of her own. I find her research is thorough and her engaging words are fair although none of our urban problems is left off the table. But mental illness, substance abuse, unemployment, domestic violence, poverty, homelessness and absentee parents are widespread problems. The Pittsfield community and all of America can learn from the stories of these young women, and from the successful programs here and in other communities that Lipper describes in her closing chapters. We owe it to these girls and to their children to do our best.

A wonderfully poignant book
This book takes place in Pittsfield, Mass. and it documents the lives of 6 teenage mothers. This book is very sad because of the lives these girls had and the troubles that they went through with the fathers of their children. I am 16 and I have a 5 month old daughter so I can relate to the situation that these girls are in to some extent. I didn't have an abusive boyfriend and he wasn't addicted to drugs. But I can relate to not having the father around and having to do this all by myself while going to school. I couldn't put this book down, I was very moved by it. The stories that these girls had to share about their lives and growing up are just heartbreaking. You are tempted to laugh at some of there thoughts before they were pregnant but then you remember that they didn't know any better. So I recommend this book to teen parents, teens and parents. This book is good for everyone. It teaches us to be thankful for what we have and the freedom that we have. Read this book if it's a rainy day and you just want to curl up in a big comfy chair with a blanket and a hot cup of something. This is definately a snuggle book.

an extraodinary work
This book is so naturally written you will feel like you are in the same room with the six girls whose lives it explores. By turns deeply personal and then again unflinchingly political, Joanna Lipper's probing investigative journalism reveals the hidden truths of life in Pittsfield, Massachusetts--which like hundreds of postindustrial communities all across the United States, is struggling with the fact that the jobs that were once there disappeared into thin air when the factories closed--and children are paying the price. Lipper's detailed, incisive examination of the enormous role class plays in shaping destiny and opportunity, reminds me of another writer she discusses in one section of the book, Edith Wharton, whose novel, Summer, also set in the Berkshires, is about a teen mother. Like Edith Wharton, Joanna Lipper portrays the deep, complex internal lives of young women, which are full of conflict, pathos, longing, romantic ideals, disappointments, challenges, determination, and in the end, resilience.