When reading a book, we often feel a deep connection with the book’s main character. But what if the character is not only related to the reader through events, but through emotions as well? This is a constant connection students feel when they read about the book, “The Distance Between Us”, a memoir of the author, Reyna Grande, about her life growing up in an immigrant family and the struggles that came along with it.

Freshman Bao Nguyen had no expectations and initially felt no connection to the book.

“I had no reaction, just another assignment, try to keep my grade up [and] try not to fail the class,” Nguyen said.

He also added his input on how he might have felt throughout reading the book.

“I thought it would be a mix, because the title, ‘The Distance Between Us’ sounded sad, but usually stories have happy endings,” Nguyen said.

After reading the first few chapters of the book, he shares his thoughts on how the story slightly surprised him.

“I was surprised at how fast the storyline was going. In chapter one, her mom’s gone, dad’s not there and she starts to live with her grandmother and her three siblings. It was really hard to capture the picture of what was going on,” Nguyen said.

After reading towards the half-way point of the book, Nguyen expresses his thoughts on the main character in the story, Reyna.

“I would say it’s unimaginable. I would never think at that age someone could go through immigration, crossing the border, getting caught by I.C.E and going through a lot of stuff,” Nguyen said.

This is followed by his opinion on how he was able to connect with Reyna’s character.

“I would relate to how she felt about her grandmother because my grandmother kind of acted the same way towards my dad and me,” Nguyen said.

The freshman student shares his final thoughts and opinions on the book after completing it.

“[Reyna] was going through different obstacles and having emotional issues, physical too, way too many issues for a kid to handle, and she was able to go past it, to overcome it and grow while being illegal. But in the end, she studied, she grew and she succeeded,” Nguyen said.

Freshman student Emilio Laguna also shares his thoughts on the book.

“It reminded me of a book that I read in 8th grade that was similar to an immigrant story,” Laguna said.

Laguna also adds how he felt the book would make him feel while reading.

”I thought it was going to be a sad book…I felt like it was going to switch between multiple emotions, but mostly from sad until a person overcomes that and becomes happy,” Laguna said.

Laguna then shares how he felt after reading the first few chapters of the book.

“[I] felt that Reyna was just someone who was unlucky. Her dad wasn’t there, and that later on she had to stay with her grandma who didn’t like her and was just abusive and I just felt she was unlucky to be born in that situation,” Laguna said.

Personally, my experience reading the book was that I had been shocked at how well Reyna had captured the image of an overall experience on how living and growing up in an immigrant community would be. It also showed me that people all over the world go through the same situations Reynas’ family had gone through. From learning to understand how others around her felt, to switching worlds completely when moving to America, she was able to continue with her life, providing us this picture on how she lived and how others around her were affected too.

What some students thought to be a normal book was something much more to others. A book that students saw as average, instead were able to connect to their struggles in life, and emotional connections they felt resonated with them inside the characters as well. Being able to show students that even the simplest of books can share the perspective of a group of people whose stories and life experiences are never shared or voices are never heard.