#1 NEW YORK TIMES, WALL STREET JOURNAL, AND BOSTON GLOBE BESTSELLER • One of the most acclaimed books of our time: an unforgettable memoir about a young woman who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University “Extraordinary . . . an act of courage and self-invention.”—The New York Times NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW … Times
NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW • ONE OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA’S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR • BILL GATES’S HOLIDAY READING LIST • FINALIST: National Book Critics Circle’s Award In Autobiography and John Leonard Prize For Best First Book • PEN/Jean Stein Book Award • Los Angeles Times Book Prize
Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Her family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education, and no one to intervene when one of Tara’s older brothers became violent. When another brother got himself into college, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge University. Only then would she wonder if she’d traveled too far, if there was still a way home.
“Beautiful and propulsive . . . Despite the singularity of [Westover’s] childhood, the questions her book poses are universal: How much of ourselves should we give to those we love? And how much must we betray them to grow up?”—Vogue
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Washington Post • O: The Oprah Magazine • Time • NPR • Good Morning America • San Francisco Chronicle • The Guardian • The Economist • Financial Times • Newsday • New York Post • theSkimm • Refinery29 • Bloomberg • Self • Real Simple • Town & Country • Bustle • Paste • Publishers Weekly • Library Journal • LibraryReads • Book Riot • Pamela Paul, KQED • New York Public Library
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Westover’s memoir is beautiful and evocative. Its heartwrenching depiction of family and the power of embracing a life of the mind are unforgettable.
It is rare that I finish a 325 page book in four days. That’s how good this was.
What I am left with is the courage it took to publish this. The author is only 34 years old. Her entire nuclear family is still alive, mostly working in the family business back in Idaho. The three siblings who got an education took it all the way to PhD, yet they are the ones who are ostrasized by their parents.
Although the physical, emotional, and spiritual danger in this story is palpable, what struck me most is the price we pay for loyalty to our beliefs and for being true to ourselves. This book is for those who decide not to sell their soul when someone is trying to wrest it from them.
This is the story of a young girl’s metamorphosis, her rise from the ashes of her parent’s scrapheap despite all odds. Her father believed the end of the world was imminent and the government against him. His mental illness led to many hardships over the years. Read my entire review, including skip factor and who should read at https://cyndiezahner.com/reviews/educated-by-tara-westover/
I had mixed emotions about this memoir, but no matter, it’s a riveting read about this woman’s life in a fundamentalist Mormon family, and then breaking away from them to earn a PhD from Cambridge. It’s a remarkable story any way you look at it.
There’s a reason why Educated by Tara Westover is the hottest new memoir of the year! It’s almost unbelievable, terrible and inspiring all at once.
I was just putting the finishing touches on my own memoir, Freckled: a Memoir of Growing up Wild in Hawaii, when I came across Westover’s gritty, dark tale of growing up in a Mormon survivalist family that worked in a scrapyard and practiced holistic medicine.
Tara not only overcame horrendous injuries and abuse, but she went all the way to Harvard and Oxford on determination alone. Not for the faint of heart, this memoir is dark, beautifully written, and illustrates the complex clash of family loyalty with personal dreams and ambitions.
Tara Westover grew up in rural Idaho, at the foot of a mountain known as Buck Peak. She describes her childhood, helping in the home and in her father’s junkyard with the expectation that she will follow her mother’s path and become a herbalist and midwife, marry and have children. Going to school is not on the family radar.
Tara wants to learn and studies at home to gain entrance into Brigham Young University, earns a Gates scholarship to study at Cambridge University and becomes “Educated.”
However, the true education in this memoir is the growth of Tara’s self esteem as she struggles to overcome both physical and mental abuse, while her parents and some of her siblings remain in denial.
Many of the scenes she describes make for grim reading, and although she has sought professional help for her wounds, Tara has had to disengage from some family members.
A very brave and thought provoking memoir.
Educated is a memoir that is a stark testimony to the effects of mental illness on entire families, and powerful evidence of the resilient strength possessed (or not) by individuals within such families. Tara Westover managed to rise above all she (miraculously) lived through and everything she was “taught” within her dysfunctional family. Even basic survival was not a given, so her subsequent academic accomplishments and successes are even more astounding. As a retired teacher who has seen a lot, I found this book to be a frightening reminder of how many children still today slip through the cracks. I am happy that Tara’s innate survival instincts and high level of intelligence enabled her to escape her lifestyle, but saddened to think any child should ever have to face all she did. Many do not find her success.
I heard Tara Westover’s interview on NPR and immediately bought her book afterward. The twisted life of living with secluded conspiracy theorist family members lead her to break free and learn for herself. The story is humbling, mind-boggling, and inspirational. This book will really make you feel.
Sometimes I want to reach into a book and grab the writer and yell, WHAT?? Tara Westover has written an alarming, brave, and insightful memoir in EDUCATED. I have so many questions about her decisions and experience, and that is good, because when a book causes the reader to think and ask, it is pretty darn solid. The premise, that Westover went from the Idaho hills to Cambridge and Harvard without growing up in the classroom, is stunning enough. But her experience with family is enough to stun the reader as well. I cannot divulge a singe word about those experiences, but suffice it to say, I know what she means about the savage attack coming out of the blue, and it’s not pretty. Much of what she writes is not pretty. But better to face it and try to grasp it and understand it than sweep it away. Westover has stepped forward and opened a curtain over the dark. Kudos to her for writing this story.
A remarkable read about a young girl growing up in a fundamentalist Mormon family who prepared for the end of the world, believed that the government and health professionals weren’t to be trusted and that education should only come from home-schooling.
How Tara Westover achieved her education without stepping into a classroom until she was in university is quite incredible. But this memoir is more than her struggle and achievement towards education. It’s a journey to understand her family and her place in it after she learns how to think and question and challenge her family and the way they live.
As a small child, Tara is home-schooled, learning to read and write mostly from the bible. When she’s big enough she is enlisted alongside her other siblings, seven in all, to help out in her fathers scrapping junkyard. Her father knows nothing of safety and when he threw scraps of metal Tara made sure she got out of the way. Indeed, the accidents on the site made for harrowing reading: her brother Luke’s burning leg, another brother, Shawn who fell from a great height, her mother’s head injury after a motor vehicle accident where seat belts weren’t worn and finally her father’s own horrific accident where he almost died. What was even more horrifying was the parents’ belief that the injuries could be dealt with at home from faith and herbal remedies; Doctors were never visited and hospital was out of the question; Tara herself suffered as well.
“My back struck iron: the trailers wall. My feet snapped over my head and I continued my graceless plunge to the ground. The first fall was seven or eight feet, the second perhaps ten.” Of her mother’s reaction to her fall? “She rested her left hand lightly on the gash and crossed the fingers of her right. Her eyes closed. Click, click, click. ‘There’s no tetanus,’ she said. ‘The wound will close. Eventually. But it’ll leave a nasty scab.’
As Tara grew into her teens, she realised her place as a woman in the family and outside of it. She was constantly reminded of her place in the kitchen by her father. A loving relationship between her and her older brother Shawn turned sour and violent in her teen years scarring her physically, emotionally and mentally. The terrifying violence was made all the sadder because Tara and her family cover for Shawn. When she questions it as she grows older and challenges what he has done, the family turns against her.
It’s a sad story but also an uplifting one as Tara makes her way in the world without the shackles of her gaslighting family. You could mistake her childhood memories as being inaccurate or exaggerated, but she has verified her memories with those of her older brothers, Tyler, Richard and Tony. They made their way out on their own and have been supportive of her.
This is an extremely well written and impactful story detailing a life not in the 1800’s but in the last thirty odd years. An incredible read.
Tara Westover was raised to obey her father and forsake the norms so many of us take for granted in our lives.
I’m overwhelmed by how the author overcame the insecurities that came from being born female in an environment that considered females ‘less than.’ Walking away from what she knew and allowing herself to grow took such courage. I cheered her on at every step and empathized with every slip backward.
Beautifully written in the voice of a young woman facing what she wasn’t to become what she was meant to be, Educated is a treasure. Tara’s ability to drill into her family’s truth and herself, to acknowledge what she didn’t know to educate herself, reflects a strength not often seen, especially in someone so young.
Educated is a book for everyone: those who need to learn of someone else’s courage to build up their own, for those who need to see a struggle other than their own.
I cannot recommend this book enough.
Someone who pushed through the culture of her upbringing to make a success of herself. An amazing journey. One of the best reads of my year.
It was the most kinda romantic and then I thought maybe it’s not, maybe it’s just easy to read, A lot of wittiness, and fortunately I thought it was absolutely informative. In Addition, I also thought it was inspiring. Most definitely, I’m pretty sure she worked her butt off of these AMAZING books she had written. So much for UnDisappointment. I would love to have the opportunity to read more of her books! Overall, I would put this in dialogue” Oh my goodness. She is so informative and absolutely inspiring”.
Most said I’m so happy that she is a great writer. I’m surprised and also too shocked, and plenty of impressed. So, as said enough I’m glad books are in the hands of lives. And did I mention that I’m a 11 year old writing all of this? Well, you are probably thinking “Is this a joke? Is she lying? Is she out of her mind?” Well one answer to one of those questions are: Yes, I am out of my mind. Because no matter how much people look at you, or no matter how much people think, love is out there! I’m actually a 6th grader. Can I share something with you? Ok, so my favorite subject in school is Reading & Writing. Can’t you tell? Well, here you are, reading my “What do you like about this author”.
This is a memoir of an extremely difficult childhood and family situation, but in the end the author finds herself, despite all she went through.
I have always thought my childhood was tough, but after reading Tara Westover’s EDUCATED, I will have to do some reevaluation. Tara Westover was born in Idaho into a distinctly unconventional family; her father did not believe in public education, her mother was distrustful of doctors and the medical establishment. Tara Westover suffered psychological and physical abuse from mentally ill family members, and her experience is eye-opening. This book should be read by everyone. I don’t want to say much more as I don’t want to diminish your reading experience with spoilers. EDUCATED will shock you… more than a few of Tara’s experiences made me gasp. This book will open your eyes to a world of religious fanaticism, survivalist ideology, bi-polar behavior and the enabling of that behavior, abuse in many forms, misogynism, and more, but it will also show you the power and invincibility of the human spirit and the importance of education, self-examination, and the persistence of self-development. All of us should strive to become better people, to rise above, no matter what circumstances we were born into. Read EDUCATED. Read it today.
After hearing many positive reviews I finally got around to reading Educated by Tara Westover. It was fantastic! It is a Memoir about her life growing up in the Idaho mountain region in a extremist and fanatical Morman family. She is indoctrinated at home with these beliefs. The children were never allowed to have a birth certificate, go to school, or have any medication. As Tara matures she endures heartache, loss, humiliation, and physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her family. At the same time, she gains an inner strength, a hunger for knowledge, the ability to escape and belonging in other ways. Told as a poignant tale she transcends this lifestyle. Tara takes with her lessons learned to improve her life and get a formal education on top of her education from the mountain. An excellent book and a must read!
Wow! This book blew me away, so much so that I spent a few hours the day after finishing it listening to YouTube interviews with Tara Westover. I especially appreciate Tara’s telling of the story without casting stones. And in her interviews, she shares further how education in its true sense is the ability to hear another viewpoint without jumping to conclusions or immediately categorizing someone you disagree with as ‘wrong’ or ‘bad’. We are all human and deserve to be regarded as such before we are judged. Wise words for America in this time of crazy polarization.
I can’t stop thinking or talking about this book. I’ve got all my friends and family reading this incredible memoir as well. I’m not sure how a young woman raised by survivalists, who kept her out of school and subjected her to so much trauma, rose up to become such a gifted writer but the proof is on the pages. Tremendous achievement!
Wow! This book blew me away! I rarely read mémoires unless it’s for research, but when my neighbor told me a little about Educated I had to read it. My heart is still aching for the author Tara Westover. I hope writing about her very painful and unique childhood and young adult life has truly helped her heal.
What an AMAZING book! I don’t normally pick up memoirs, but this was on the reading list for my book club so I picked it up and I am so glad I did. Almost hard to believe it is a true story. The narrative reads similar to fiction with one life event leading to the next like plot points. Tara’s life is intriguing and scary and downright different from what most people experience, and I could not stop reading. It follows her life isolated from mainstream society in a self-sustaining family of survivalists that don’t believe in schools, hospitals or any help outside of the family unit. Tara does not attend school for the first time until she is seventeen years old and then educates herself in an attempt to break from the cycle and experience the world. That education expands her mind and indeed takes her around the world, but not before getting pulled back in to several harrowing family experiences. Readers get a birds-eye view into her life as she attempts to redefine herself outside of the family; she gains a new identity but makes sacrifices along the way and it all unfolds masterfully with the words that Tara lays down on these pages. Once the book was done, I wanted more; I dug up interviews and articles about Tara and her life just to satisfy that need. I highly recommend this book!