Customer Reviews

I Live Here

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is really a series of four smaller books inside a unique packaging. Each book illuminates the lives, often horrendous, of people in Ingushetia, Ciudad Juarez, Burma, and Malawi. Each book has a slightly different approach to the subject matter, using Mia Kirshner's journals and interviews, graphic novel techniques and photographs from her collaborators. There is nothing lightweight in here. If Mia Kirshner's career as an actress lead me to this book, she totally downplays any glamour and sticks totally to the subject at hand. I applaud all those involved for their courage and insights

The anthology I Live Here is spearheaded by actress and debut author Mia Kirshner (The L Word) and collects four short books focusing on displaced women and children around the world. A hardcover sleeve opens to reveal four individual paperbacks to pull out and digest one at a time. Each book opens with Kirshner's journals from her travels to each location and is followed by a series of related writings and illustrations.

The first book takes readers to Ingushetia, a refugee camp not far from Grozny, Chechnya, during the fighting that has continued since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. In this book, Kirshner and her cohorts prove to be talented and engaging writers, crafting such vivid imagery (in this collection and the three that follow) of extreme circumstances that it can be almost physically gut-wrenching in the way a Chuck Palahniuk novel has the power to turn readers' stomachs.

It can be overwrought at times, but that physical connection is designed to make readers truly empathize and pay attention to the dismal situations. The authors and artists pull no punches in their depictions of the darkest, dirtiest, and most horrible of things that are happening to their subjects, but it is all with the goal of affecting their readers.

Celebrated comics journalist Joe Sacco contributed a graphic novella, "Chechen War, Chechen Women," to the first book that may be the finest of the collection. Sacco offers an incredible amount of detail--culled from a personal trip to the refugee camp--in his recognizable black-and-white art style.

The second book focuses on Burma, or the Union of Myanmar, the infamous war zone of Southeast Asia that has seen refugees fleeing to bordering Thailand for roughly 50 years. This book, like most in the collection, forgoes a broad explanation of the situations (brief summaries can be found inside the hardcover sleeve) in favor of individual accounts designed to personalize the events. The artists tell a disturbing and deeply affecting tale of manual labor, home abortions, and the sex trade.

The final two books focus on Ciudad Juárez, a city facing El Paso, Texas, on the United-States-Mexico border, and Malawi, a dense African republic plagued by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The former tackles the stories of women who are disappearing from the factory-laden city and touches upon the drug-trafficking, rape, and murder that are reportedly prevalent in the area. The latter spotlights the overbearing feeling the AIDS scare can have on everyday life when one lives in a country where one out of five people has contracted HIV and coffin demand is so high the area is becoming deforested.

Any project of this magnitude is bound to have its problems, and I Live Here is no exception. Readers will inevitably gravitate toward certain authors and artists over others in the varied project, but the impact of this Amnesty International-supported venture is hard to deny. It is a celebration of art in its many forms, and an important call to awareness.

-- William Jones

What can I say that hasn't already been said about this AMAZINGLY produced book?

If you have a heart go out and buy a copy of this book. It will change your perspective about life. Also, it makes you realize that more humanitarians are needed in this world.

Mia Kirshner writes from the heart about her experiences to these four places in need of humanitarian efforts.
Dont forget to help out her organization, I Live Here, by making a donation.

Remember that WE are all humans and everyone of us will need help from someone else one day. Give a helping hand today in order to make the difference TOMORROW!

I didn't know what to expect from Mia Kirshner's I Live Here, but by the time I was finished, I had discovered depths to the glamorous actress I never knew were there. Now I have an enormous amount of respect for Kirshner.

I Live Here is a work of non-fiction, published with support from Amnesty International USA, about Kirshner's trips to four of the poorest, most desperate places on Earth to gather information and stories from the people: Chechen refugees living in camps in Ingushetia; Burmese refugees in Thailand, most of whom are forced into the sex industry; frightened women in Ciudad Juarez, on the Mexico-Texas border, where over 400 women have disappeared in the last decade, most of them later found dead, their deaths unsolved; and orphans in Malawi, Africa, where one in five people are HIV positive. It's a harrowing, eye opening work. Sometimes it's hard to believe how much misery and suffering exist in this world. We don't always want to be reminded of it, either. It's difficult to read about these places and the desperate people who populate them. But it's also heartening to see how much hope they hold in their hearts for a better tomorrow. The human spirit doesn't give up easily, even in the worst of conditions.

The design of the book is outstanding, too. It's comprised of four separate booklets, one for each place she visited, that are filled with journal entries, stories, photographs and -- most interestingly -- comics: each booklet has at least one "graphic novella." The four booklets are themselves encased in a single hefty, folding cover that is created to look like a whitewashed brick wall.

A fantastic job all around.

Very eye-opening book. Made me want to get up and do something for all of the people that this book talks about. Mia Kirshner's writing style is different, but in a good way that is easy to read and is easy to relate to. Also all of the different types of writing (journals, comics, prose pieces) make this book fresh and interesting.

What sets this book apart from other similar ones is the cool minds and warm hearts of its creators.

For someone who has been born/raised/lived in wealthy, developed nations, who must have taken basic human rights for granted, the exposure to such darkness must be shocking and enraging at times. Yet, the writers have displayed tremendous refrain from judging the perpetrators/oppressors. While witnessing gut-wrenching human sufferings, a ray of hope from the creators hearts shines through the pages. Yes, things are really f***ed up in these places. Yes, some people, the monsters who plundered, raped and tortured, seemed to be beyond rehabilitation. Yep, thousands of AIDS victims, and their orphans,will die of the lack of medical treatments.

Nonetheless, those writers, especially Mia Kirshner, believes something must be done. She remains hopeful and her heart is brimming with compassion. If you have $20 to spare, go buy this book to help out those much less fortunate than you are!

First of all I will say that this book's format was very original and I loved it. I gave it 4 stars because I thought the editorial cartoons of the situation in Chechnya were very compelling and an very effective medium for explaining the situation there. I was literally shocked at the scenes describing the smell of mold and the food provided by the Russian humanitarian organization. The cartoon was EXCELLENT. 5 stars!

The photographs and artwork are also amazing and impactful. 5 stars!

What I did NOT like about this book was that I feel Mia Kirshner's journals are excessive and with slightly self absorbed undertones. In the section about the brothel, I honestly did not care that she gave some guy "hand jobs" in a theater or that she "felt like an amateur" after being questioned by soldiers. I also felt her journal in the Chechnya section about the "Michael Bolton of war journalists" was a bit insulting to war journalists as the profession is dangerous and deserves more respect. She made it sounds as if they are hungry for the story and not concerned about humanity.

I wanted MORE stories of the disadvantaged people that the book focuses on. I felt that I got more of Mia Kirshner than I did of them. I would have liked to hear the story of the woman in Malawi in first person instead of Mia's point of view. Although I do give Mia credit for visiting these places, they are dangerous and that showed remarkable courage, but I wanted more stories of the people in these places and I felt that I did not get enough of that. That was slightly disappointing for me.

I honestly don't know much about Mia Kirshner as an actress etc... This book was referred to me through Amnesty International. I was hoping for more in it though. I still gave it 4 stars because the visual elements are outstanding just one tip for the next book: please include more stories of the displaced persons etc... I want to hear their voices speak to me in first person.

This compilation of four smaller books presents the stories of refugees in four different countries in a poignant unique format of mixed media: photographs, comics, journaling and travel writing.

You'll be transported to Ingushetia (Russia)and the home of 15,000 refugees, to Burma with 100,000 people in refugee camps, to Juarzez, Mexico where women disappear from the streets, and to Malawi where over 20 percent of the population lives with AIDS. The numbers are staggering, but the stories are personal and individual.

Your view of the world will change from seeing just the sheer numbers to knowing the individuals that live the horrors and triumph simply by enduring.

Mia Kirshner and everyone that contributed to this book did a wonderful job. The book talks about displaced people from different parts of the world that you don't normally hear about. It's a sad, inspiring and moving book. Can't wait till the next one in the series comes out.

This is a must have book - very emotional reading - it really brings life into prespective & lets you appreciate how fortunate you are with the life you have