Jersey Girl: Long Branch Native and Author Dr. Yvonne Thornton Has Nothing to Prove by Amy Byrnes “I’m not Snookie, I’m not JWoWW, but I’ve been a Jersey girl for a long time,” Long Branch native and author Dr. Yvonne S. Thornton told the crowd gathered to hear her read from her new memoir on Saturday at the Eatontown Barnes & Noble. Throughout her talk, Thornton stopped to wave to people she recognized in the audience of approximately 75 people including old friends from Long Branch, her alma mater Monmouth University and even her high school guidance counselor. Valerie Brown drove down from Maine with her husband to hear Thornton whose book, Something to Prove: A Daughter’s Journey to Fulfill a Father’s Legacy, chronicles her climb from the projects in Long Branch to breaking the glass ceiling of the medical profession. Thornton also discussed not only her own personal and professional achievements but those of her two now-adult children. Both were accomplished chess players and attended Ivy League schools and are now studying to become doctors. Tinton Falls resident Dr. Brian Roper asked Thornton for words of encouragement for his two school-aged daughters also in the audience. "Many young women are fearful of that," Thornton said. " 'I'll lose my standing with regard to the corporate ladder if I take some time off to have children.' And I'm saying, 'Not really.' " “Your father loves you,” she told Brianne, 11, and Brielle,9, “but not everyone else will.” She said her father had prepared his six daughters for a world outside the cocoon they grew up in Long Branch in the 50s. “Excellence is the only answer to racism,” Thornton’s father taught his daughters. “When you’re a woman, especially in a male-dominated profession like medicine, you always have something to prove,” she told the crowd.