“Pittsburgh: This Is Not Who We Are” by Annika Urban is the moving story of a girl who lives in a place where violence is spreading. After the Parkland school shooting, Urban started participating in political activism and made sure her voice was heard, writing a letter to Senator Bob Casey, Jr. Gun violence surrounded and entrapped her, or as she would say, “... encircling and suffocation, this is how I view gun violence.” She will never view the once joyful place that she grew up in as the same place it has turned into.

Although Urban tries to make her voice be heard, they are covered with the constant hate speech and mail bombs. Innocent children go to school on the daily worrying about people invading their schools. “Then gun violence spread and somehow it got closer to me. Somehow, my advocacy, inspired by others hundreds of miles away from me, hadn’t shielded my city, and gun deaths and mass shootings approached closer to my home.” We must all band together to make our voices be heard. Enough is enough. To conclude, this passionate and sincere piece published in the December 2018 issue of TeenInk magazine will be worth reading.