Incredible true story of young girl raised in a survivalist family where the word of God and her father rule her upbringing. Amazing the strength and courage she had to muster to educate herself and escape that small tiny world she only knew.

Two different worlds converge and collide in this autobiographical account of a young woman growing in self worth and worldly knowledge. The imagery portrayed through her writing was evident on the first page of the Prologue. I was drawn into the pictorial account of her writing by the vivid phrases used to portray the geography where she was raised. The story gave an open account of the trials that familial relationships go through when faced with conflicting personalities and challenging mental health issues. As the author grew in understanding through education, she was forced to acknowledge discrepancies in what she had been taught growing up and what she learned through advancing her learning. Quite fascinating to read how the author grew as she encountered new ideas and reflected on disturbing memories from the past. Additionally, though lacking in a formal education in her youth, it was astonishing to read the rapid progression during which her education occurred.

While I was moved by Tara's story, I was less impressed by the storytelling. This was an intense read and I kept wanting it to just be over and for Tara to tell of her happy ending. For me this would have been a better inspirational talk or magazine article than a book.

I found it difficult to put this book down! Westover's story was fascinating. It wasn't perfect - there were problems with pacing here and there - but then again, I don't think I'd trust the veracity of a perfectly paced memoir. I wish her all the best, and I'm glad I read her story.

Loved this story of a girl who can step away from her family and move forward to reach unheard of levels of accomplishment and happiness. She did it with dignity and no need to trash her parents or their beliefs. Thank you for not making the Mormons look like strange fanatics, but acknowledging it was her father taking his beliefs too far.

Fabulous book. Thoroughly loved. Highly recommend!

A memoir covering Westover's childhood growing up in Idaho with an unstable, violent family, obsessed with preparing for the end of the world, to her escape into higher education <i>Educated</i> was a difficult book to read. Not because it is technically difficult, but because I was mentally screaming at the abuse she had to endure at the hands of her family, even into her adulthood.

Furthermore, I was surprised by the tone of the book. I wanted her to condemn her family for what they had done to her (I really, really wanted her to!) but Westover makes few judgments as she lays out the facts for us.

Overall, it's an interesting, hard read. Maybe not my cup of tea, but well written all the same.

I would recommend this book to folks who like a memoirs about disturbing childhoods (You know who you are), and folks who like to read about doomsday preppers.

With Educated Tara Westover writes a startling memoir of her life growing up in a fundamentalist family that believes in complete self-reliance. Their anti-government attitude extends to public schools, and Tara receives very little homeschooling.
When Tara, despite opposition from family members, does attend university later, she is at first confused by the history surrounding the Holocaust and the Civil Rights Movement, because not only had she not been taught about these items at home, she had also been fed an ideology that did not square with them.
As she works on her formal education, she is torn by her loyalty to her family and her desire to learn and think critically. This struggle continues through her graduation from Brigham Young University to her studies at Cambridge and Harvard.
This book covers a great deal of ground, and it is especially good at portraying the emotional and mental damage caused by the extremism and abuse of family members.
However, Educated is also about the mental and emotional growth that occurs through education. It's about the importance of support by friends and others. And finally, it's about breaking with those who would hold you back and choosing those who love and support you.
This is a powerful and important book that is well worth your time!
[This review, or a version thereof, will be published on bookreflections.com on or around February 20th, 2018)

She was the youngest of seven, one sister, five brothers. Raised on a mountain top in Idsho, by a survivalist father and midwife mother . Of the Mormon religion, her father preached the coming of the end days, intrusion by the government, built a bomb shelter, stockpiled fuel, food, guns. He ruled with an iron fist, the word of God and the family fell in line. Though there was another factor in her father's psyche that she wouldn't understand or figure out until much later. There were no doctor visits, no immunizations, no formal schooling, no friends other than family, so many things not allowed. They were in effect totally off the grid. Yet, somehow this young woman manages to educate herself, pull herself out of the morass of the paranoia her father fed on and used to control the family.

When I read books like these, people despite all odds to the contrary that manage to overcome so much adversity and rise to meet and supercede lives challenges, I am awed. The things one reads in this book are unbelievable, difficult to assimilate, and yet they happened. The struggles that Tara had to overcome are written without excess emotion, though in her words you do realize just how hard this struggle was and is still. Her journey, not without many steps back, at times literally tore her apart. I always wonder why and how some people are able to pull themselves out and above these situations, while some cannot, as is apparent in her own family. Where do they find their strength of will?

My first five star read of the year, and I have nothing but admiration and respect for this young woman, who is a formidable person indeed. I hope she continues to find the peace she needs, and is able to resolve her relationship with her family.

ARC from Netgalley.

It is inevitable that a reader/reviewer will be attracted to books of similar subjects, and nowhere was it more evident than two books I read recently -- Kristin Hannah's The Great Alone and this debut work by Tara Westover, Educated. Both present an isolated family controlled by a delusional charismatic father. Hannah's tragedy plays out in the far north of Alaska, while Educated is centered in the deep wilderness of Idaho. To me, Westover's memoir is by far the more powerful for being true. With no defense but her own developing mind, Tara fights the sick family dynamic created by her paranoid father and his perverted view of the will of God. The extraordinary fact that Tara never attended school and was barely educated at home makes her drive to get a college education all the more remarkable. Watching her steady battle against the roadblocks set up by her family is only half the story. Her lucid writing takes us deep into her own stunted character development. Never have I had a clearer understanding of the self-doubt that torments an individual with little support system. The story is even more remarkable as it continues to be written beyond the pages of the book. There is no easy conclusion with all loose endings neatly tied up. This is a life that is only now reaching its potential. I look forward to more of Westover's insightful writing.

Wow. Just Wow.

I described this book, poorly, to my husband as "a Glass Castle on steroids," but of course, it is similar but also nothing the same.

It boggles my mind what some endure, and how they detach from it (or survive it) to go on to lead normal and/or successful lives, and others cannot/do not.

There were times when this book was almost impossible to continue, it was so horrible to imagine.

I am glad I read this book and wish Tara Westover the very best of everything.

Thank you to Netgalley for the opportunity to read this amazing book.

Wow. Just wow. What a story of strength and tenacity and the power of the human spirit.

Wow. If you're looking for a book to assure you that you did, indeed, have a pretty decent childhood, here you go. I'm so glad Tara survived her harrowing upbringing and was able to get her "education."

*Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an e-galley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was one that touched me. Reading all that the family has been through was quite an emotional roller coaster ride.

This was such an engaging book. I still cannot believe all the accidents that happened to this family and they all survived without hospital interventions. A sad commentary of parents who raise their children with their zealous religious beliefs. Such physical, mental, emotional abuse in this book. I felt the author ‘s deep commitment to her family and the anguish she experienced when she finally let them go and focused on herself . Tara understood the value of knowledge and how being educated creates a better self. Tara was lucky she encountered many good people on her journey. They saw the real Tara and with their guidance and love she was able to reshape herself . She made many sacrifices along the way and the future that was once a junkyard is much more appealing and promising. I loved the descriptions of the mountains and how Tara longed for them . Their solidarity drew her home so often , but also allowed her to gain strength and determination. Thanks netgalley. A fantastic memoir.

This was a hard book to read in many ways: The dysfunctional family and the emotional and physical abuse made this not a fun read -- but it was an important one.

Tara models amazing perseverance and intelligence that allow her to escape her sad situation. And it is the outcome of her struggles that makes this such a compelling read.

This story is not about what we understand as organized education in the US. It's about personal survival, and as such, it speaks to so many of us on so many levels.

One of the best memoirs I have a read in a long time. I loved loved LOVED this book! I could not put it down. In chapter after chapter, the author pulls you into the world of her childhood, a world structured by a father's extreme Mormon views and survivalist lifestyle. Not allowed to attend school or receive any medical care, Tara works in a dangerous junkyard and is subject to her brother's abuse. The reader follows Tara as she slowly ventures out of her sheltered existence and discovers a wider world - one in which she succeeds in earning a Ph.D from Cambridge. A fascinating look at the transformative power of education.

For nonfiction, this is an amazing story. Tara Westover is only in her early 30s but her life has been so different, from my life certainly, but also from those she grew up around in a small town in Idaho. The youngest of seven children, Tara's parents were determined to be good Mormons as well as taking care of their family without government help or interference. Her father was the driving force behind this fear of government and need to be ready to survive with his family when the end times arrive. Although her older brothers went to school, by the time Tara was old enough they were home schooled which involved not that much school. Her mother was a gifted herbalist who ended up becoming an uncertified midwife and the whole family was involved in their father's scrap business.
Three quarters of this book is Tara growing up, describing their life which was often scary when her father was upset (or one brother in particular). It includes several horrific accidents which were treated holistically in the family because of a deep distrust of doctors and medicines. As Tara grows up she sees some of her brothers leave the family home to start a business or seek more education and eventually decides she wants to do this. The last part of this book when Tara goes to BYU and then farther afield is riveting as she describes how hard it was to leap into classes that are familiar to everyone except her: truly she didn't know what she didn't know. This is an excellent book that will keep you reading.

I requested this memoir from Netgalley and was grateful to receive a complimentary e-booky for review. The author's journey is well worth reading, but I did not realize the book would have so many descriptive passage of violence. It is amazing that the author was able to find the strength to break away from her family and overall the book is inspiring.

Thank you to Netgalley for sending me this ARC.

If you are looking for the next Glass Castle, please look no further. Tara grew up in the mountains of Idaho with her father who believed that the world would end during Y2K, (or really it could all end at anytime) and made sure they were well prepared with plenty of guns, shelters, and canned preserves to last a lifetime. Her father also hated the government, which meant that he didn't send her or her siblings to school, or even to the hospital when injured (and trust me, they were so often seriously injured over the course of this book that it was miraculous that they all managed to make it to adulthood). He was also undiagnosed bipolar and devout Mormon, who often preached to his family and found few to be equal in his strict morals.

Her mother was a midwife, as well as a "healer" who used strictly herbal medicines. Tara had six siblings, a couple of whom were able to break away from their mountain life and get into college, while the rest stayed near the mountain working with her father as scrappers of metal in their large (and quite dangerous) junkyard. Much of the horrors Tara went through were due to her older brother Shawn, another undiagnosed bipolar, and altogether verbally abusive and violent individual who would regularly terrorize Tara, and yet shared a bond with her that she found hard to break.

With the encouragement of one of her others brothers who had previously left the family to become educated himself, Tara manages to pass the ACT/SAT (with little formal education) and get into college. While there the world opens up to her and she comes to realize just how limited her world was before this. For example: She asked one of her professor's in a freshman year college class what the word "holocaust" meant, to the stunned silence of everyone in the room.

Her education comes at the price of being pulled further and further away from her family and life on the mountain. And it becomes a question of whether she can somehow maintain both worlds.

An absorbing, inspiring, and somewhat heartbreaking tale of overcoming the odds you were born into. Your next great book club read is here folks, and you will not be disappointed.