Just Listen

By: Sarah Dessen

Narrated by: Jennifer Ikeda

From the award-winning and New York Times bestselling author of The Rest of the Story comes a moving novel about the power of finding and speaking your truth.

When she’s modeling, Annabel Greene is the picture of perfection—the girl who has everything.

But her real life is far from perfect. Her best friend Sophie and she are no longer speaking; her older sister’s eating disorder is affecting everything at home.

Then she meets Owen. He’s intense, music-obsessed, and dedicated to always telling the truth.

And most of all, he’s determined to make Annabel happy. . .

“This is young adult fiction at its best.” —School Library Journal

I love Sarah Dessen

I loved all her books.That's how I knew the name Above but ten stars great job to everybody

Great story!

I really enjoyed the story and how much I related to the characters. I felt a deep connection to Annabel and her struggles. I loved the book but wasn't a fan of the narrator. Her male voices weren't very good and at times it was hard to listen. Other then that, the book was great.

Just as good as I remember it!

Read this as teenager when I was younger and it brings back all the memories I had experienced during my first time reading it. The story itself is meaningful as you follow Annabelle into becoming the type of person she wants to be, instead of who she is at the beginning of the book. However, this book is about Annabelle only, meaning you shouldn’t read or listen to this if you want a fulfilling love story full of cute moments between the main character and the love interest Owen, which was essentially non-existent. He was there to help Annabelle develop into who she wanted to be and that’s pretty much it. Not that this book needed more insight into their relationship, but it would’ve been nice to get some cute romantic development in there, which only had a few moments. I just couldn’t see how their relationship turned into a romantic one when really, they seemed more so as friends than anything else, which can be a bummer to some people. The one thing I disliked was Owen and his obsession with music and literally that’s all he talks about. Although I get that that was the intention of his character, it was a bit overboard and it didn’t feel like he had any depth to him. Their love story wasn’t interesting, but this book isn’t about that, but about the journey of self realization and character development for Annabelle. The narrator was great, but I could not stand her voice for Owen and often times, messed up the way I wanted to see him versus the way she voiced him as. Also, they had a build up for Sophie, only for it to never be discussed again, which was a huge miss for character development on her part. Other than that, it’s a pretty good book, however Sarah Dessen has better books out there, which I will be binging on. This was just comfortably delightful!

More than I thought I would

I really enjoyed this story more than I thought I would. The character development paralelos with a lot of what we’re seeing in
Modern times with the me too movement.
I really hope they make a good
Movie out of this book. Really smiled wide when characters from this lullaby crossed paths with the characters in this story as well. It’s a good nugget to put in the story and enjoy.

Didn't expect it to be so good.

I had very low expectations from a y/a novel set in the early 00's that wasn't fantasy, but I was pleasantly surprised. It was very well done.