This book fairly burst onto the scene recently. And I have to be honest and say that I was not originally that interested in reading it. I had seen comparisons to The Glass Castle, which I had read and enjoyed years ago, but just was not in the mood for. I figured I’d hold onto it in the back of my mind and wait til I was ready…and not be too worried if I never got there. But it seriously kept popping up. It seemed like literally everyone was reading it and loving it and every single review talked about how mid-blowing the story was, how no one could put it down. I confess, my curiosity got the better of me. I added myself to the library waitlist for the audiobook (my preferred method of “reading” nonfiction) and had it in my hands a couple weeks later. And seriously, holy mouth hanging open, Batman, this book was everything everyone was saying and more. Even if you are like me, if you aren’t sure you want to read it now (or ever), ignore all that and give it a go.

“The decisions I made after that moment were not the ones she would have made. They were the choices of a changed person, a new self. You could call this selfhood many things. Transformation. Metamorphosis. Falsity. Betrayal. I call it an education.”

I finished this over a week ago, but it’s taken me that long to work up the gumption to write this review. It’s never taken me that long before. I don’t even think I’ve really pulled it together enough yet, internally, but I’m starting to be nervous that I’ll leave something out if I don’t get my feelings down soon. This is nonfiction. It’s the author’s true story about her life and upbringing. But wow, is it the type of nonfiction that makes you say out loud “that cannot possibly be real” (and proves that sometimes reality is crazier than anything one can make up). Basically, Tara’s parents are Mormons, strict ones. Her father is (we learn as the story unfolds) probably bipolar, causing him to be paranoid, have delusions of conspiracy, and be a sort of doomsday-prepper. Her family lived (lives) on a mountaintop in rural Idaho, fairly removed from community and modernity, and she never attended any sort of organized school. That is, not until an older brother (of which there are many) convinces her to study for the ACT and she gets into BYU. That’s right, college classes at BYU as a 17-year-old are her first time in classroom schooling, and really her first experience with any sort of broad range worldview awareness. As she moves through her education, from BYU to Cambridge to Harvard and beyond, we readers watch both her journey of personal growth and discovery and her struggle to compromise her new knowledge/self with her family and old life. The stress of that separation is visceral as Tara recounts her tale…and the conflict of education versus tradition, in her own life and in a larger sense, becomes the focal point of her development.

I’m not really sure that I have the words to tell you how jaw-droppingly shocking the majority of this book it. Seriously, I must have gasped and clapped my hand over my mouth probably 15 different times, for 15 different reasons, while listening. The story of Tara’s life is, in the literal sense, unbelievable. And, though at times I felt almost guilty about this reaction (because this is seriously her life, her family’s life, this is not a fictional story!), it had that “I cannot look away from this train wreck” page-turning quality. From her family’s insistence on not visiting doctors/using modern medicine (even in some of the most horrifying circumstances) to some of the insanely unsafe junkyard/construction practices her father used to the world events Tara had no idea about when starting college (things like The Holocaust) it was, truly, incredible. Then there were other things, like how big her mother got in the essential oil/chakra healing industry or Tara’s singing/acting “career” as a child or the small things she wasn’t prepared for in the “real world” (like needing a blue book for college exams – though honestly, I didn’t know about that either before my first exam, when do they actually tell you about those?), that were fascinating in completely different ways. Perhaps not as horrible or shocking, but still bordering on the unreal.

And then there is the biggest, most difficult storyline, the one running through the entire memoir, of Tara’s struggle to become who she is today. She dealt with so much shaming, physical and emotional trauma, and more at the hands of her family (primarily her father and one brother in particular) that caused her to completely shut down, to disassociate, to remove herself, a number of times. The psychological strain she was under from these abuses was immense, but she had no choice but to find ways to deal with all that alone…and even after she “left” her family, these claws were still in her and she still felt that she was on her own in dealing with it. Her lack of trust and general embarrassment about her past and her experiences was heartbreaking, but easily understandable and empathize-able. And, though many of her specific situations are individual to her, in this particular sense her story is not unique (and to that end, I do want to include a trigger warning for physical and emotional abuse to anyone reading this).

However, through it all, Tara continues to push at the boundaries of the life she was born and raised in. With support first from a brother, intermittently (and inconsistently) from other family members, and later from various professors and mentors, she takes step after step to become what she calls, in the end, “educated.” Her objectiveness in writing this story, her own story, is amazing. Although she tells things like they were, pulling no punches about either the situations (as she sees it looking back – these evaluations of her own behavior/actions were one of my favorite parts) or her reactions to them, she does it all with a lens of clarity that is beyond admirable. It is so clear from her writing how much her family means to her, how much she loves them, and how much she wants more than anything to give them the benefit of the doubt and portray them in as positive a light as she can (and her guilt when she cannot). And you can clearly see how much harder that gets as her story progresses and she learns more, both as far as general knowledge and self-actualization, but she never stops trying. It’s possibly one of the most real and heartrending aspects of this book.

I know, looking back, that my feelings and reactions while reading are not even close to fully captured in this review. This is just one of those improbable tales of courage, persistence, support that is as inspiring as it is unlikely. But it’s also completely authentic – there were no rose-tinted glasses or preposterous accusations here – this is just a plain old “telling it like it was” story of an anything but plain old story. Seriously, this went beyond my expectations in so many ways and I absolutely recommend it.

This memoir is inspiring and horrifying g at the same time. Tara's story is a testament to the human spirit and it's ability to overcome while also being a lesson on the lasting damage abuse and neglect can cause. Her intellect and drive to learn are amazing.

First, let me say that Tara Westover is a brilliant storyteller. I was engrossed in this book by the third sentence. It's a memoir of her life growing up in a secluded part of Idaho with her large family as they prepare for the end of days. Specifically, her strictly religious father believes the world will implode on Y2K and they spend their days stockpiling weapons, food, silver (instead of cash) and herbal remedies. He insists that the family lives off the grid, not allowing the children to attend school or go to the doctor, the younger of the children don't even have birth certificates since they were born at home. Where this book fell short for me, was when Tara grows up attends BYU. I find it a bit difficult to believe that someone who never had any formal education could get admitted to a college or university, but she did. This last quarter of this book just felt disjointed and things didn't add up for me. *ARC provided by the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

tara westover has written a haunting memoir that i could barely put down. her experiences growing up in her father’s house was unbelievable. her spirit and determination to survive and thrive despite the circumstances.

I have put off reviewing this book because I couldn't quite decide how I felt about it. I found it to be a quick, engrossing read and that seems to be the popular opinion both here and on goodreads. What has me struggling to write this review is that I felt myself questioning a lot of things in the book and wondering if details were exaggerated or made up. This is not meant to take away from Tara Westover's experience or story because I did truly find her story compelling but there were some elements that I just found hard to wrap my mind around. I will say that this book is a good but hard read. The images and descriptions of emotional and physical abuse were hard to read and a lot to process. I found myself putting the book down to process and then coming back. I think this is worth the read and would recommend it to others.

A heartbreaking, yet uplifting memoir. A young Mormon girl who is deprived of education and a safe home is able to eventually get a doctorate at Harvard. The story is hard to read, but mezmerizing. The abuse she endures at the hands of family members is unbelievable.

A fantastic memoir from beginning to end. Tough to read at parts, but man, what a story. To think that someone could make it through life without even knowing what the Holocaust was? It just goes to show that you never know someone's story.

This is the most gripping, emotionally engaging memoir I have ever read. The writing was so good and word choices so precise that I had to remind myself that this was nonfiction. I loved it! I will be recommending this to my book club for discussion.

WOW, this book was amazing. I still have trouble believing this was a true story. Tara Westover's family lives in a hidden world and there story will amaze you!

Wow! What a powerful book! Tara’s gut wrenching story was certainly a page turner from beginning to end.

“This is not a story about being Mormon,” writes New York Times Bestselling author Tara Westover, at the start of Educated, a book that has been compared to narratives about cults. I’ll admit that I was intrigued initially, based on this description, but I was quickly won over by Westover’s candid and heartfelt account of her experience growing up in the mountains as part of a fundamentalist Mormon family. Readers who love a good, gritty memoir packed with excitement and a narrator that you can’t help but root for will love Educated.

Family Values

There were many elements of Tara Westover’s life that shocked and surprised me, to the point that I couldn’t set down the book, because I just had to know what would happen. The many visceral descriptions of abuse and other frightening moments in Westover’s life were fascinating to read about, but what stuck out as the most dynamic parts of the story were not her “escape” into more “mainstream” culture, but the relationships that she had with her family.

Even though Westover lives through some truly terrible moments at the hands of her older brother Shawn and her bipolar father, the view that she creates of her family feels balanced. No one is ever quite a villain in this piece, which makes them all the more endearing to read about. I think it is because she includes such tender, honest moments between these characters that they are made human in the readers’ eyes. Because I felt that Westover loved her family despite their flaws, I found myself loving them too.

A College Narrative with a Twist

Maybe it is because I went on to post-secondary education that I was attracted to the descriptions of Tara at College, but I liked reading about her experiences there. This section of the book had some particularly excellent tension, as I was constantly wondering how she would pass courses that required knowledge Tara did not have based on her lack of a high school education, or how she would pay for another semester when she was too broke to eat.

Even more fascinating was Tara’s point of view as a strict Mormon living for the first time with “gentiles.” It was a unique perspective to view and I found that while the earlier scenes featuring her family (and the many times that Tara was put in dangerous situations), this section had its own revelations that kept me turning the pages. I loved reading about her gentile roommates, who had to remind her to wash her hands, or the moment in a lecture where she didn’t know who Hitler was. Reading this section gave me a clearer sense of Westover’s struggle.

Read This Book

Deeply moving, raw and wild like the mountain that she hails from, Tara Westover’s Educated is a narrative that you won’t want to miss. I may have come for the sensational story about escape from a survivalist family, but I found that I never wanted to leave.

This book was so violent and gave off such an air of desperation that it was sometimes hard to read. I'm glad I did, but I couldn't believe she stayed with her family for so long. I liked this book as a tale of overcoming such great odds but I wish she had talked more about leaving (or not?) her faith and some of the relationships she left behind with her friends from college.

“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” —Maya Angelou.
As I finished Educated, this quote above by Maya Angelou comes to mind.
Educated documents a woman's journey from an abusive highly dysfunctional family in Idaho to a place far far away from it with a PhD from Cambridge. Education being the vehicle of escape.
Tara Westover has done open heart surgery on herself in order to write this difficult to read and amazing story of her life. This book is probably one of the most difficult books I have read in a long time yet it was also difficult to put down.
Tara's story can be simply boiled down to a story of abuse and mental illness but I also find it impossible to ignore the effect of the Mormon religion/cult on this dysfunctional family. She says at the opening of the book, almost as an apology, that she does not intend her memoir to be about Mormonism or any other kind of religion. She wants it to be about the people, good and bad. So, if we put the religion/cult aside, Tara survived a childhood without a birth certificate, modern medicine, vaccines, school, safety ... and with violence, physical and mental abuse, crazy "end of the world" and "the government is coming to get us" conspiracy theories and mentally ill father and brain damaged mother. WOW! How can anyone come out of this?
I am in awe of Tara Westover for what she has accomplished in spite of these circumstances. My heart broke every time she crawled out a little bit in search of herself only to be pulled back in as she yearned for the love and acceptance of her crazy parents and also the cultist indoctrination of her religion.
There is so much here in this memoir to think about and relate to. I was fortunate enough to come from a loving caring family but this book had me thinking about my parents and how would I have known as a child what was abuse? As children, we only know what is normal to us. Tara lived in isolation with her family in a mountain in the middle of nowhere Idaho.
I recommend this book highly and I think this will be in the best of 2018. It is in my "best of 2018" bookshelf.

I was interested in reading Educated because of the subject of this book- the idea that a girl had never stepped into a classroom until the age of 17, and then went on to earn a doctorate at Cambridge. I knew part of the story was about her upbringing and the violence and abuse she suffered, but I expected the other part to be more about her education. The title of the book had more to do about what it took for her to throw off the brainwashing and about her having to negotiate the loss of her family. Her 'education' was about learning to be okay with who she is, even if it means she can't have her family. I recommend this book to people who are interested in the family dynamics and peculiar upbringing she had more than to someone who wants to read more about being educated after having received little to no schooling.

"An unforgettable memoir about a young girl who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University.

Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, she prepared for the end of the world by stockpiling home-canned peaches and sleeping with her “head-for-the-hills” bag. In the summer she stewed herbs for her mother, a midwife and healer, and in the winter she salvaged metal in her father’s junkyard.

Her father distrusted the medical establishment, so Tara never saw a doctor or nurse. Gashes and concussions, even burns from explosions, were all treated at home with herbalism. The 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 an older brother became violent.

When another brother got himself into college and came back with news of the world beyond the mountain, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. She taught herself enough mathematics, grammar, and science to take the ACT and was admitted to Brigham Young University. There, she studied psychology, politics, philosophy, and history, learning for the first time about pivotal world events like the Holocaust and the Civil Rights Movement. 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.

Educated is an account of the struggle for self-invention. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty, and of the grief that comes from severing ties with those closest to you. With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, Westover has crafted a universal coming-of-age story that gets to the heart of what an education is and what it offers: the perspective to see one’s life through new eyes, and the will to change it."

This sounds fascinating if just for the fact Tara has lived the exact opposite life I have.

This memoir is truly quite gobsmacking. Tara Westover is raised by parents who have an abundance of strange, one could well say crackpot beliefs. They believed the government was coming after them, they discounted all western medicine, they believed the “state” to be evil and the school system to be unnecessary and to be avoided at all costs. The result of this was that Tara and her siblings were indoctrinated with fear and suspicion and remained completely ignorant of even basic schooling and knowledge of the outside world. How the author triumphed over this to eventually earn a PhD from some of the world’s best schools is truly amazing. Her story is compelling and her writing is great. This is a memoir not to be missed.
My thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an arc in exchange for my honest review.

Beautifully written! The author has such a way of painting a picture that I was hooked from the first page. I enjoyed watching her build her strength and I cheered for her along the way. So many of her stories were hard to read and harder to believe. An awe-inspiring story of a woman finding her way despite the obstacles both real and imagined.

In her memoir, debut author Tara Westover brings readers along on her journey from her childhood as “an ignorant girl who’d crawled out of a scrap heap” to the upper echelons of academia. She grew up on a mountain in rural Idaho called Buck’s Peak, the youngest of seven children in a family headed by her survivalist father and midwife mother. Her parents were so dedicated to staying off the grid that their younger children had no birth certificates, no visits to the doctor (despite several severe injuries), and no formal schooling. Tara’s homeschooling experience was unstructured at best, and she spent most of her childhood lending a hand at her father’s scrapyard. Eager to escape an abusive older brother, Tara began to eye college as a possible route to a different kind of life. After four years at Brigham Young University, where she often felt like a fish-out-of-water, Tara began graduate studies at Cambridge in England. Through education, her worldview expanded exponentially: “I felt an animating surge of adrenaline, of possibility, of a frontier being pushed outward.” Tara Westover is a gifted writer, vividly depicting her early years on Buck’s Peak, her adolescence, and her journey into a future that is different from her past. She also takes a loving, nonjudgmental approach in portraying her extremist parents, even as she rejects the pain and violence associated with their way of life. Educated is a must-have for every library’s biography section!

this hit memoir was nice in it's angle: the author's intellectual journey related to her own personal fight for an education - from school basics to grad school

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Highly recommended read! Thanks for providing through Net Galley. Five Stars *****