You're Not a Girl in a Movie by Hala Alyan

You're Not a Girl in a Movie Reviews

• 
  Jasmine Sauceda

  Instructions for reading: don’t listen to this while you’re driving. Give yourself time to meditate over these words. It’s okay to cry.
  This book pulled some emotions up that almost felt unwarranted, but the words and their repetition. There’s something enchanting when you listen to the spell.
• 
  twopurplebookends

  I absolutely loved “In an argument, My Love Calls Me Fragile.” Well done.
• 
  Emily Coffee and Commentary

  Powerful and gripping. Hala Alyan narrates the tough aspects of life, from toxic relationship to generational trauma, from self loathing to self love, from refugee to revolutionary. Absolutely beautiful and raw poetry.
• 
  Mariah Roze

  Great poetry book!
  
  "You’re Not a Girl in a Movie is a new collection of powerful poems by Hala Alyan, winner of the Arab American Book Award in Poetry and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. In these nine extraordinary poems, Alyan wrestles with the intimate themes that have driven her acclaimed body of work to date: the aching loss of homeland, the image and worth of women, and the violence of love. In Beirut, Brooklyn, and roads in the American West, she unravels the effects of decades of war and displacement on love and human worth and identity. She speaks to mothers and grandmothers, past lovers and friends, and through her shimmering, wrenching glimpses of internal and political chaos, pleads for home."
• 
  literaryelise

  “Like how Meryem says I love you infinity / and I know what she means is / I love you like neither of us will ever die.”
  
  Incredible poetry collection!!
• 
  C.L. Cannon

  Powerful words, artfully crafted, and meanigfully written.
• 
  alexandra

  3.5 stars
  
  Admittedly took much longer to get through for such a short collection of poems because I kept thinking that I needed a transcription of the works in order to truly fall in love with what they meant. This is not true. There is such strength in this poet who relies on her cultural background of trauma and immigration that ties each work to the other, and it's beautiful.
  
  100% recommend!
  
  Favourites:
  - In An Argument, My Love Calls Me Fragile
  - To The Men I Didn't Marry
  - Valentine
  - I Haven't Had a Drink in Seven Years
• 
  Mel Kenney

  WOW!!! Powerful. Moving. Thought provoking. I will be processing these set of poems for some time to come.
• 
  Morgan

  This poetry collection packs a punch, some I liked more than others but overall it’s worth the read/listen.
• 
  Haley

  Turns out I actually do like poetry.
• 
  🌶 peppersocks 🧦

  Reflections and lessons learned:
  “You are the person I think about when life is difficult”
  
  “Where you are from is where you break…”
  
  A beautifully beat style delivered, short collection of poetry on growing, battling and experiencing - I especially enjoyed the sections ‘How to survive your body’ and ‘To the men I didn’t marry’ - definitely a poet that I’m looking forward to reading more from
• 
  Kristina

  Favorite poems were "In an argument, my love calls me fragile" and "To the men I didn't marry".
• 
  Jasmine

  This is great. I didn't know anything about it before I started listening to it. I like that a lot of it is about the experience of being Palestinian.
• 
  Iva

  This is a very touching, shocking and moving poetry collection consisting of 9 poems. I listened to it all at once because I just couldn't stop. I will come back to it for sure.
• 
  April

  I'm so torn... Part of my wants to give this 5 stars for the real/raw emotion communicated so well. I enjoyed hearing the author read her poetry herself (this was an audiobook). "In an Argument, My Love Calls Me Fragile" was particularly moving.
  
  That said, another part of me considered giving it only 2 stars because of a few F-bombs and content that's definitely for mature adults only... Real life and true history is hard and ugly at times, but this won't be a book I register l revisit to study more thoughtfully. I would love to hear her stories communicated in a way that puts growth and healing above shock value.
  
  She's a talented writer, and I know some of my friends would be captivated from start to finish - it's a beautiful journey - but I can't wholeheartedly recommend a book that dwells on brokenness without also pointing you to Grace.
• 
  Envi

  i cried. this book reminded me why i love poetry so much
• 
  B Suarez

  A really good set of poems. They talk about love and loss
• 
  Adam

  This was a really nice collection of poems. Each one felt raw, real, and very well written.
• 
  Kirsten LaCole

  I enjoyed this Audible very much. Beautiful written, thoughtful, and powerful! Poetry in motion
• 
  Dianna

  i am BEGGING y’all to experience this poetry collection through it’s audiobook format. alyan is the kind of poet that makes you FEEL her words with her performance. my personal favorite of this collection was “in an argument, my love calls me fragile."
• 
  Sydney Arvanitas

  The kind of poetry you hear in a moodily lit cafe sometime after 11PM and the girl reciting it has black eyeliner and a nose piercing. I liked it!
• 
  Sidnie

  For fans of Rupi Kaur, this is a short book of poems, recommend listening for the spoken word aspect, but I really loved specific lines.
• 
  Momo

  After rereading it's at a 4-star for me now because I didn't enjoy it as much as I did the first time but I think it was still beautifully written.
• 
  Peter Longden

  This is a remarkable series of poems, more than a collection, it tells the story of lives affected by turmoil in a home country, war, displacement, love, human worth and identity seen from a distance.
  There are powerful poems in the collection, thought-provoking and emotive, Hala Alyan evokes strong imagery through the poetic techniques she chooses, crafting poems beautifully, making them compelling reading, picturing what are people’s experiences of unrest in Beirut.
  My favourites include:
  In An Argument, My Love Calls Me Fragile
  To The Men I Didn't Marry
  Valentine
  I Haven't Had a Drink in Seven Years (having particular resonance with me).
  All this said, I recommend reading this with no distractions, such powerful words deserve total concentration to understand.
  
• 
  Tara Sullivan

  I downloaded this short poetry collection from Audible because I liked the title, and also because I've decided that I need to read more poetry. But mostly, I liked the title. It was a quick read (only 35 minutes), but full of emotion and gorgeous language. I plan to listen to it again soon and hopefully track down a copy of these poems in print.
• 
  Lk

  I am a tourist in the museum of my own bad timing
  you are my most prized collection

  
  -- Hala Alyan from the poem To the Men I Didn't Marry
  
  Discovered a new way of enjoying poems: by listening to them through an audiobook.
  
  Faves:
  In an Argument, My Love Calls Me Fragile
  How to Survive Your Body
  The Gods of Beirut
• 
  Neuravinci

  I would give "You're Not a Girl in a Movie" infinity stars. I re-listened to several poems because they were so beautiful, and each time, I cried a little harder.
  
  Beauty encapsulated and written.
  
  My favorite poems are:
  
  In an Argument, My Love Calls Me Fragile
  The Gods of Beirut
  How to Survive Your Body
• 
  TheGeekProblem

  Listening to poetry audiobooks is great, but I do feel you need the physical book so you can follow through the meaning behind everything.
  
  Short and sweet, some were incredibly good and other were pretty normal but still good.
• 
  Linda Hulsey-Magness

  This was a new experience for me as I do not typically read or listen to poetry. I found this short listen enjoyable and fun. I am glad I gave this a chance since it was a free Audible selection of the month.