This book is at times crushingly devastating and in the end joyously uplifting, In inviting us to come along on her journey of constant self-reflection in the often next-to-impossible to navigate maelstrom of life lived on minimum wage, Land skillfully disabuses readers of any preconceived notions they might be harboring about low-wage workers and government benefit recipients.

This is a remarkable work of sociology and, though not specifically intended for the academic market, I would highly recommend it in introductory undergraduate classes in that subject area. In professional schools, it would be well-suited to introductory medical school classes geared toward introducing students to the concerns facing low income patients. Professors teaching in law school (as I do) will undoubtedly find the book invaluable in clinical courses as a means of encouraging students to check their own biases, while empowering them to come to an understanding of the true value of pro bono work in the lives of their clients in both the clinical setting and in their eventual careers as licensed practitioners. The book would also be used profitably in doctrinal courses in public benefits law as supplemental reading alongside black letter law.

In Maid, Stephanie Land has written a riveting memoir detailing her experience as a single mother with no familial support system and minimal marketable skills.

Ms, Land recounts her experiences in applying for and using government assistance, and her frustration at increasing her income, only to lose a corresponding amount in government benefits. She vividly describes the experience of being a single mother who has an adversarial relationship with the father of her child. She also gives the reader a thorough insight into the mind-numbing, back-breaking work of being the unseen maid, cleaning the messes of clients and their often impossible demands and unreasonable expectations. There is a bit of whining when the author insists that she landed in this situation through no fault of her own; although everything is related to one poor choice.

I would recommend this title to anyone wanting to learn more about the working poor, as well as anyone wanting to read a different sort of memoir.

In the interest of full disclosure, I received a free digital copy of this title to review from Net Galley.

#Maid#NetGalley

It’s humbling when you come face-to-face with the story of someone working hard and just barely surviving. Maid is an eye-opening account of Stephanie Land’s struggle to provide for herself and her daughter as part of the working poor. Land’s honesty and transparency are refreshing while at times also heartbreaking. The juxtaposition of her lifestyle with that of the the families she serves is profound.

Maid is a well-executed narrative of what poverty really looks like in the United States and why the “just get a job” solution is horribly oversimplified.

I have been following Land's journey on Instagram and was excited to get ahold of an early copy. (Thank you, Hachette and Netgalley.) Initially, I felt a bit as though I'd been dropped into the middle of a story that began long before the opening page. For the first half of the book, I longed for the backstory to help me understand her situation. I wanted more about her childhood, the family that failed her, the nuances of her failed romantic relationships. I also wanted more of her passion for writing and how this carried her through such dark times. It felt a bit like a puzzle with missing pieces, making the entire picture difficult to comprehend. However, the second half of MAID shines -- especially when Land's self-awareness (in a particularly vivid passage about the privilege of hope) becomes clear. And it is this hope and steadfastness that, by the end, had me cheering her along. She depicts the struggles of single-motherhood in poverty with authenticity and honesty. I suspect this story will resonate with many readers who have found the rug pulled out from under them, and particularly with single mothers of young children.

People want to tell you how to live your life and, if you're poor, they feel justified to do so. Images of people in soup kitchen lines, smartphone in hand, go viral. Stories of shopping sprees or vacations after tax refunds are shared with judgement. High mobility rates are scrutinized. Parenting practices questioned. In my case, the First Edition Club that feeds my soul in this rural landscape is brought up as frivolous spending without any regard to the rest of the picture.

If random urinalysis and proof of employment is required of people accepting government assistance, then Stephanie Land's Maid is required reading for all people privileged enough to have never degraded themselves to get help. Stephanie allows readers the opportunity to explore life as a single mom, a maid, cleaning as many homes as possible just to survive. When there is hardly enough money to get by until the next paycheck, how does one manage a sick child, work cancellations, or car trouble? A better job is the obvious answer, but how do you afford the laptop or internet access required to go back to school let alone childcare, time off work, and tuition? How does one afford preventative health care when organic food and vitamins are luxuries?

"When a person is too deep in systemic poverty, there is no upward trajectory. Life is a struggle and nothing else."

Start your new year with a dose of empathy and order this book today!

I loved this book. It was so eyeopening and it really puts everything into perspective. no one is better than anyone else, we were all just dealt a different hand.

I would like to thank the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a Kindle copy of "Maid," by Stephanie Land. "Maid" is a devastating account of the working poor and single parenthood in the United States. Ms. Land becomes pregnant at a young age to a man who doesn't love her. Once her daughter is born, her life spirals into a cycle of survival. She works at a cleaning service, long hours, low pay and hard work, to be able to feed and clothe her young daughter and have a place to live. She dreams of better things for herself and her child. Stephanie takes classes and starts her own side business cleaning homes. Ms.Land's touching and realistic writing of her real-life struggles are heart-rending. Her writing style is like a well-written novel, but the painful fact is that its not fiction. Stephanie manages to pull herself up and out of her bad situation with very admirable determination. Her book is an excellent read for anyone who has ever been a single parent, wants to pull him or herself up by the bootstraps and anyone who likes a real-life version of a survival story.

This is an interesting memoir detailing one woman's account of American poverty. A young, single mother navigates the government assistance programs available to her and her daughter, such as section 8 housing, food stamps and child care subsidies as she earns a living as a maid. It's more interesting than my summary makes it sound.

I'm reminded of Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, by Barbara Ehrenreich and also a little of Educated, by Tarah Westover. I don't think I would place this book on the same level as the other two in terms of writing quality, but it is thought-provoking and a little bit heartbreaking. I have no idea how to fix or improve the system and neither does the author. But that's not really the point. It's just one woman's story. The bleakest part is that there are tens of thousands of stories like hers that don't get the happy ending she got, allowing her the opportunity to tell her story.

Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review. I really wanted to love this book. I immediately requested it when it came across my radar, mainly because I saw Barbara Ehrenreich’s name attached and this looked to be in the same vein as Nickel and Dimed (which I loved). At first, I was really intrigued and had a lot of compassion for Stephanie and her situation. As the book went on though, it was increasingly hard to sympathize with her- she constantly blames everyone except herself for everything going on in her life. The tone of the book became extremely whiny, and the fact that she constantly made comments to her clients about the things she couldn’t afford / how little she was getting paid to clean their homes was truly cringeworthy- it was super uncomfortable to read, so can’t imagine how awkward it must have been for the clients she was constantly saying these things to. I will say, her writing is beautiful and I would definitely read more from her based on that. I was so curious to know more about her relationships with her family members, and the other side to those stories. It’s hard to fathom having family that would allow their daughter & young granddaughter to be homeless, hungry, etc. and not do something to help them, especially with a young child involved. This was a very real glimpse into poverty and “the system”, and despite my annoyance at the strong martyr tone the author took, I’m definitely in awe of her determination and strength, and really happy that she and Mia dug their way out and have found happiness and a better life.

Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive


Stephanie Land didn’t have it easy.  She was a single mom who worked hard cleaning other people’s houses, working in their yards, doing whatever she had to in order to feed herself and her daughter, Mia. This was after she found herself homeless when the father of her daughter kicked them out. It’s not like she felt she could ask her folks for help, no way. She found that government help for housing wasn’t easy to stomach, left them with no privacy and was very stressful. So she fought hard to avoid ever being in that position again if she could help it.

When she found herself suddenly homeless again a couple of years later after a breakup with a year-long boyfriend and he gave her a month to move out, she refused to go back to a shelter. She was trying so hard to get ahead, taking classes online, studying at night when her daughter slept, trying to get a degree. With the help of friends this time, Stephanie managed to move them into a tiny studio apartment and stored much of their things and worked harder than ever to stay afloat. There were times she drank coffee to help with the hunger pains, and there were times she had to go a couple of weeks without coffee even.


This book is very readable, though not easy topics, it moves well. I found it a very interesting record of what Stephanie went through during that time in her life as she did what she had to in order to get by for her and her daughter.  She’s very strong and put up with a lot. It had to be terribly hard without any family help all that time, and no support system to speak of much of the time. You could really feel for her, the loneliness and aching as she slogged along wanting a better life. My thanks for the advance electronic copy that was provided by NetGalley, author Stephanie Land, and the publisher for my fair review.

Publisher: Hachette Books  288 pages
Publication: Jan 22nd, 2019



The Author-- Journalist Stephanie Land's work has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Vox, Salon, and many other outlets. She focuses on social and economic justice as a writing fellow through both the Center for Community Change and the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.

I was thrilled to death for the opportunity to read an ARC of his new book. I was drawn in from the first chapter and could hardly put it down! Highly recommend!

A life lived right in my own back yard, a single mother tries to provide for her young daughter in Skagit County of Washington State. Stephanie has a high school diploma and some college community credits from Running Start, yet is stuck in a cycle of low-paying jobs. Once her daughter comes along and an abusive relationship spirals out of control, Stephanie must rely on the only safety net she has: herself and the government. Unable to get help from generations of poverty in her own family, she takes the one job she can - cleaning homes. We see the private lives of many of Stephanie's clients, the results of a low-paying job with no benefits, no sick pay, no vacation, and what life is like living on the edge, one mistake or life accident away from disaster. Often, I found myself being judgmental and then stopping myself, acknowledging my own privilege, and learning from Stephanie's heartfelt story of her life. This book will provide a ton of conversation at your next book club, trust me.

[I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]

Quotes:

"I would do what parents do, what parents had done for generations--I'd make it work. There was no questioning. No other option. I was a mother now. I would honor that responsibility for the rest of my life. I got up, and on my way out, I ripped up my college application and went to work."

"When people think of food stamps they don't envision someone like me . . . Someone like the girl they'd known in high school who'd been quiet but nice. Someone like a neighbor. Someone like them. Maybe that made them too nervous about their own situation. Maybe they saw, in me, the chance of their own fragile circumstance, that, with one lost job, one divorce, they'd be in he same place as I was."


Ever since reading The Glass Castle a little over a year ago, I can't get enough of memoirs. So when this one showed up on NetGalley, I was quick to request it. I was amazed by Stephanie Land's life and the daily trials she had to endure. But perhaps most of all, I was amazed by her determination and love for her daughter, no matter what.

Stephanie's story is intriguing because it feels close to home. She wasn't too much older than me when her life fell apart starting with an abusive relationship. Although I'm not in an abusive relationship, is struck me how very close we all are to losing everything that makes us feel secure: relationships, jobs, finances, cars, homes, etc. A few tragedies is all it takes.

I think what really stuck with me after reading this book is never assume you know what someone is going through, and never judge based on appearances. It's easy when you see that woman with children in the checkout line using food stamps to judge her choice of foods, to judge the kinds of clothes she and her kids or wearing, or make assumptions about how she got there. Don't.

This book really opened my eyes to the need in our world. There are so many people who lack basic, everyday provisions, and I was inspired to educate myself about the need and see how I can do something about it.

All in all, this was an excellent, enlightening book that changed how I view poverty.

I was granted a copy of this book from Netgalley. I was thrilled I actually forced myself to read it before the publication date! #somanybookssolittletime

Before I really critique a lot of the logic in this book, I'd like to say the story did suck me in overall. I finished it in 3 days, which is really fast for me. So I definitely found myself running back to it when I had free time to read.

However, it got very hard to read at times because of the author's complete inability to take any kind of blame for the situation that she ended up in. There were several passages I highlighted that I'd like to mention.

She mentions going through the line at a store and paying with an EBT card and the stigmas that are attached to that. When describing one of the stigmas, she writes, "Anyone who used food stamps didn't work hard enough, or made bad decisions to put them in that lower-class place." I need to mention here that she had sex and had a child with a man she met on a park bench who was a total piece of shit. But yet she fails to recognize that the "made bad decisions to put them in that lower-class place" actually does describe her. I do recognize that she didn't have the backing of parents or grandparents to really help her financially, and I am sympathetic to that, but she did in fact CHOOSE to procreate with someone when she wasn't in a good position financially and she wasn't in a remotely solid relationship.

In another part of the book, she complains about how the WIC vouchers that she got stopped allowing her to buy organic milk and forced her to only buy regular non-organic milk. Am I going to be the asshole who says, "why should you buy better stuff than me with MY tax dollars when you didn't work for them?" No, I won't, but I found this complaint to be pretentious as all hell. Budgeting doesn't apply only to poor people. Budgeting applies to everyone who isn't wealthy. I am solidly middle class but still buy generic pasta/soup/cheese because that is life!

There's one section of the book where she explains that she didn't go to school for a semester because she couldn't afford it. Then later in the book, she mentions that she's going to school on the Pell grant. Therefore, she isn't paying for her education, so I don't see how she couldn't have afforded it in a prior semester. Just a strange inconsistency.

Another section of the book talks about her meeting some more people for potential work, and I'll quote what it says. "Though he probably wasn't, he seemed stoned, like most of my Fairbanks friends were at any given hour of the day. My kind of person, I thought. I liked him immediately." I can't wrap my mind around why you would like somebody immediately because they act like they could be stoned. I mean, is that considered to be like a personality trait? lol. Because to me, that shows no substance at all, either in the person she's meeting or in the author herself.

I won't go into detail about the last section I highlighted because it's 97% through the book and might be considered a spoiler, but the author makes another impulsive decision in her long line of poor, impulsive decisions. She communicates something to her daughter's father when he's having his visitation with the daughter that made absolutely no sense to do based on his past behavior and characteristics. But it was almost like her ego got the best of her and she wanted to "brag" about something that would be happening, even though the way in which she did it put her daughter in not the healthiest situation.

So yes, I did have a lot of complaints about this book, but I'm still giving it a solid 3 stars because the story did hook me. I really enjoyed hearing about the daily ins and outs of her job, and I loved reading about the different relationships that she had with her clients. I also ashamedly loved reading about the cleanliness, or lack thereof, of the houses that she cleaned, as well as the strange things or circumstances she would find in the houses. I love reading true stories about the lives of people who have different experiences than me, but it was really hard to go down this road of blaming everyone else but herself.

On a more positive note, I was incredibly impressed with the writing in this book, as well as the lack of grammatical errors. The grammar was more on point than most final copies I read, let alone ARCs. So this lady can WRITE! I would be open to reading additional works from her in the future.

Maid is a great read. The author made some decisions in life that led her to a precarious position with a child. She persevered and worked hard and diligently to provide for her child as well as she could while pursuing her dreams. To survive she cleaned houses. Some of her descriptions of what she had to clean were stomach turning. Land's writing is excellent. The narrativetvie flowed very well. I do wish she had ended with a footnote, to catch readers up on how her life had changed since the book's end.

I read a lot of books. I rarely give one five stars. To earn five stars a book has to make me want to tell everybody I know they need to read this book AND it needs to make me want to do something or be better. This book, Maid by Stephanie Land is a solid FIVE STAR BOOK! It is a beautiful written true story about Stephanie's life as a single Mom who struggles to provide a life for her daughter. It made me question how we might change "the system," and wonder about what single Mom I could offer a hand to, encourage, and support. I read till after 10 o'clock at night (another sign that a book is amazing) and woke up before 6 AM to finish it and put my feet out on the cold floor to go write a review. I did receive an ARC to review this book but I will go buy a copy and give it to someone and hope they pass it on to someone else. This is a book that catch you in the story and change your heart along the way.

I would give this a 3.5 probably. I have the utmost respect for this mother's story. She worked hard. She's a good writer. She made her dreams come true with pure tenacity. I think her survival of domestic abuse is all too common and I appreciate her openness. I would have liked a little more introspection on the ways that being a white woman provided her a safety net and the benefit of the doubt in a few situations that would not have been available to a woman of color or immigrant. Looking forward to reading more from her. (ARC/NetGalley)

As somebody who grew up in poverty but with two relatively stable parents, this was a real eye opener for me. I really enjoyed the way it was written and how dramatic the story was. I would recommend anybody who thinks the poor are just standing there with their hats in their hands, asking for something without giving anything in return to read this book so they can understand where so much of the working poor population of this country are coming from.

This book is about what it's really like to be poor and no one to rely upon except yourself. The margins between surviving and ending up homeless are very thin. You're one car accident or illness away from total disaster, and you have nothing in reserve.

Stephanie Land's book is an important one for its description of what life as a single mom with no education or job prospects is like. The author worked hard as a house cleaner to pay the bills, with little help from relatives or her daughter's father. She had to live in a moldy studio apartment that made her child sick, and she took on nasty jobs most people wouldn't do.

This was a very good book, but it could have been a great book. Like some other reviewers, I noted that she never faced up to her own initial bad decisions that landed and kept her in this situation in the first place. She got pregnant with a guy who was a loser and had no interest in becoming a parent. She never considered adoption as an option to give her child a good home, and she moved in with a guy she didn't seem to even like, seemingly in an attempt to put a roof over her head. After she complains about people ditching her over and over again, you keep wanting her to take responsibility for her share of the breakdown in her relationships, but she never does. It takes a certain maturity to admit that you've made mistakes and aren't perfect, and I just didn't see that in this book.

Overall, however, I found the book riveting and recommend it, especially to young people.

An honest and easy to read story of a single mom's struggle to survive for herself and daughter #maid #netgalley