My Name Is Not Easy

By: Debby Dahl Edwardson

Narrated by: Nick Podehl, Amy Rubinate

Length: 6 hrs and 25 mins

Publisher's summary

Luke knows his I´nupiaq name is full of sounds white people can’t say. He knows he’ll have to leave it behind when he and his brothers are sent to boarding school hundreds of miles from their Arctic village.

At Sacred Heart School things are different. Instead of family, there are students - Eskimo, Indian, White - who line up on different sides of the cafeteria like there’s some kind of war going on. And instead of comforting words like tutu and maktak, there’s English. Speaking I´nupiaq - or any native language - is forbidden. And Father Mullen, whose fury is like a force of nature, is ready to slap down those who disobey.

Luke struggles to survive at Sacred Heart. Buthe’s not the only one. There’s smart-aleck Amiq, a daring leader - if he doesn’t self-destruct; Chickie, blond and freckled, a different kind of outsider; and small quiet Junior, noticing everything and writing it all down. Each has their own story to tell. But once their separate stories come together, things at Sacred Heart School - and in the wider world - will never be the same.

©2012 Debby Dahl Edwardson (P)2012 Brilliance Audio, Inc.

EVERY AMERICAN SHOULD READ THIS!

The fictionalized (but based on truth) story of Alaskan (mostly-) native children, wrenched from their homes & sent all over the U.S. to school, where they were made to speak only English & where many tried to beat the "savage" out of them, bending to the Western idea of culture. So very many Americans don't know the story of this horrid chapter of our history, but we all should learn it. This book is very, very well written; the reader is engaged from moment one & never loses interest throughout. The narrators are exactly right. Read/listen to this. I promise, you will not be sorry.

Great until the end

I was really interested in this book and actually thought most of it was good. But it ended very abruptly and I was left thinking what the heck just happened? And not the good version. I was disappointed with how the author wrapped up the book.

Interesting and enlightening subject.

Enlightening subject, but I wish we were invited to become more emotional involved with the characters. Sometimes I felt alone in my outrage.

Captivating Story

What does Nick Podehl and Amy Rubinate bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Amy Rubinate and Nick Podehl do justice to the superbly developed characters in this captivating story. The book is written and narrated with such skill that the listener begins to see through the eyes of the boarding school students and feel with the heart of each character. It would be hoped that this book would be added to Junior High and High School Reading lists and included in classroom discussions.This neglected chapter of the history of Native Americans has waited too long to be told. It's audience reaches far beyond young adult readers. In addition to adding to our cultural awareness, this compelling story is difficult to set aside both while listening and after.

Boring

I'm not sure they is much of a story.... Bounced around between a few characters, but very weak story line.

fascinating history

The narration by, Amy Rubinate & Nick Podehl goes back and forth as we hear Luke & Chickie’s stories (they were the main two there were other stories too) both narrators are fantastic and make you feel the various emotions of these characters. Both narrators were new to me and I very much enjoyed their narration and will look for other books they have narrated!

This was a part of history I had never really heard about, how the native Alaskan children were sent away to catholic schools and were given easier names, a new language and taken away from everything they knew. This is a true story written as fiction, the forward explains why it is written as such. The story is told by different people the main 2 being Eskimo boy Luke & young white motherless Chickie a young girl from a Scandinavian background, they tell a very different yet similar story both coming from different backgrounds yet still taken away from all they know to be educated in the Catholic Boarding School.

However there is much more than just education going on at this school there are also some military experiments to test how Eskimo’s live in such cold but these tests are done with radiation and iodine- 131 and I’m sure their parents were never informed. There is also Luke’s little brother Isaac who is whisked away and adopted without consent and this is the 60’s not the 30’s. There are many tragedies along the way. There are other characters Junior, Amiq, Donna & Sonny they are white, Eskimo and Native American (it’s never really said what tribe) and how each of them is trying to find their way in the world without losing who they are.

I think this is a very important book that should be read in high school to get a feel of what Americans have done to each other as they try to Americanize the natives. It is important so that this kind of thing never happens again.

I could feel the anger of these kids, they were all treated as orphans when they weren’t they all had families even if they weren’t the greatest parents they were still alive. This story really touched me and I am very glad I read it.

I see why this book has won awards I think it is a book everyone should read especially if you are like me and this was a part of history you knew nothing about.

4 ½ Stars

Interesting but not riveting...

Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?

I learned quite a bit listening to this book. I was ignorant of the remote schooling of Alaska native children. I was unaware that the military conducted a study of the role of the thyroid gland in acclimatizating humans to cold, using iodine 131.

The characters in the book were interesting and I liked them. However, I did not connect emotionally to the characters. The story construction jumped around and did not grip me.

So I liked the book but I did not love it, hence the 3 out of 5 star rating.

Interesting, enlightening, and worthwhile story!

This beautiful and fascinating story, set in Alaska, is about Eskimo children attending a Catholic boarding school with Indians and Caucasians. I highly recommend My Name is Not Easy..

Indigenous Alaskan Experiance

A peek into indigenous residential schools of the past in far North America. Eye opening and heartbreaking, it is a look at the life of indigenous children who were sent away from family to be schooled. I learned so much and also enjoyed the descriptions of life in the not to distant past of Alaska.

Powerful Story

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Yes, this book was very gripping and sad in places. It is is fictionalized version of real events that happened in the 60's in Alaska.

What did you like best about this story?

I liked the realism in the story. The narrators did an awesome job of reading this book.

Which character – as performed by Nick Podehl and Amy Rubinate – was your favorite?

Luke. This young man wanted to help his brothers, but he was helpless to stop what happened to them.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

This book made me sad that some of these things actually happened to children particularly the Iodine 131 testing and the adopting out of Native Eskimos children.

Any additional comments?

Although those in power abused it in this story, the human spirit rose above it at the end of the story.