Can't Take That Away

By: Steven Salvatore

Narrated by: Logan Rozos

Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins

Publisher's summary

Bloomsbury presents Can't Take That Away by Steven Salvatore, read by Logan Rozos.

An empowering and emotional debut about a genderqueer teen who finds the courage to stand up and speak out for equality when they are discriminated against by their high school administration.

Carey Parker dreams of being a diva and bringing the house down with song. They can hit every note of all the top pop and Broadway hits. But despite their talent, emotional scars from an incident with a homophobic classmate and their grandmother’s spiraling dementia make it harder and harder for Carey to find their voice.

Then Carey meets Cris, a singer/guitarist who makes Carey feel seen for the first time in their life. With the rush of a promising new romantic relationship, Carey finds the confidence to audition for the role of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West, in the school musical, setting off a chain reaction of prejudice by Carey’s tormentor and others in the school. It’s up to Carey, Cris and their friends to defend their rights - and they refuse to be silenced.

Told in alternating chapters with identifying pronouns, debut author Steven Salvatore’s Can’t Take That Away conducts a powerful, uplifting anthem, a swoony romance and an affirmation of self-identity that will ignite the activist in all of us.

©2021 Steven Salvatore (P)2021 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Critic reviews

"This charming, joyful story - about self-love, fighting for what’s right, and the love to be found in chosen family - will make you want to put on a pair of red heels and blast Mariah Carey." (Booklist, starred review)

"Can't Take That Away is a charming, inspiring story about being true to who you are, regardless of what others see. A perfect balance of queer joy and resistance, this power ballad of a story will leave you changed...for good." (Phil Stamper, best-selling author of The Gravity of Us)

"Can’t Take That Away is an honest, joyful, sparkling story of love, friendship, and the unique pride that comes with being yourself in the face of adversity. Carey deserves a standing ovation!" (Jessica Verdi, author of Follow Your Arrow and And She Was)

Awesome

A great book recommend this anyone who is looking for a story about a queer Mira Cary loving activist who loves to sing

Horrible sound production

The book was pretty good. The main character was fleshed out well and the plot was pretty good. There was an enormous detractor from the book and that was the sound editing - no one did it. Every mistake the narrator made then repeated was kept. When the narrator used a different approach to a sentence, both sentences were kept. You could hear the narrator turning pages and a car horn in the background. No one bothered to edit the recording to delete mistakes, repeats, or extraneous noises. This made the book very difficult to listen to. I would say there was an error every 10 minutes or so, and each time it happened, I fell out of the story. Very irritating. Maybe read the Kindle addition instead.

CANT EVEN KNOW WHAT TO SAY

A+mazing. Brilliant. Touching. Relatable. Carey like Mariah! RECOMMEND 1000% COULDNT PUT IT AWAY! MODERN-DAY MASTERPIECE!

Great story, terrible production value!

I really loved this story! It was cute and an important story to get out in the world. My only problem with it was the terrible recording quality! It was like someone was trying to make a mixed tape from the radio ( OMG I just dated myself) I found all the obvious stop and starts and repeating of lines to be very distracting and it took me out of the story too much for my liking! I recommend this but be prepared!