A tale of place and family and community. It felt similar to other books released in the last few years, Educated and Hillbilly Elegy. I learned a great deal, and could relate to some of it.

Dirt was a book I didn't know I needed. Mary's open and honest narrative about life growing up in West Virginia and what it means to find inner grace and strength is a story that has forever changed who I am. This is the perfect read for anyone on a journey of self discovery, weeding through the things that make your story messy.

Having heard Mary share a bit about her story in person, I was excited to read it more in depth. Mary is a thoughtful writer and her attention to detail pulls you into her story. I felt like I was watching her memories!

I did not know anything about Mary Marantz prior to picking up this book. Her background is incredibly fascinating. Her storytelling sucks you in from the first word.

I am sure many of us can relate to this story. Ms. Marantz has written a lyrical story of her life. She chooses her words like an artist chooses colors to paint a picture. So well written, not a wasted word, just the perfect ones to tell her tale. It was pure pleasure to read. Kudos for finding the strength to overcome such early poverty, embrace the past, and rising above it all. Great read.

This book was perfect for the time of life I'm in. I'm in the place where I'm having to work hard to get where I want to be, as I have been for the last 20 years. It's exhausting. But this book is amazing at reminding us it's in the dark, the dirty, the hard places that we are formed, developed and grown.

I'm grateful for this book and I think every person who is going through a tough time should read this book. I say this about so many books, but this one is unique in the approach and gives you a feeling that you're not alone. Between nuggets of wisdom and hope offered through experience, it's a book that will leave you feeling empowered and encouraged.

“Grace has the power to transform. It has the power to heal wounds so deep you thought they would never close over again. But it only works, you’ll see the proof, if you are willing to let it take root.” Dirt: growing strong roots in what makes the beautiful broken and that is what Mary Marantz did. Mary grew up in the mountains of rural West Virginia, her ancestors were loggers and coal miners, she eventually is accepted into Yale’s Law school.

I am trying to put into words what I just read. Although I do not know the author, it felt like I had known her for years, the kind of friend that you would sit on the porch and start a conversation like it was just yesterday. We all get comfortable hiding the messy spots of our lives, we think that other’s will not like us because of our upbringing. Redemption, grace, strength, feeling broken is what I felt while reading Dirt. The story also encouraged me to dig deeper into my relationships, to accept my story that God laid out for me, to be molded into something beautiful.

Dirt takes us through Mary’s life growing up in the mountains of rural West Virginia in a trailer. “I used to think freedom looked a lot like being around people who aren’t muddy. Now I realize we’re all pretty muddy and maybe just a little bit broken too, no matter what kind of place we call home. And when it comes right down to it, getting each other’s mud on our hands—this serving one another in love-that’s what true freedom has always been about anyway. Because love, like integrity, is also about what we do when no one else is looking. And how we do anything is how we do everything.”

I highly recommend the book. This story deserves 10 stars.

I received an advance copy of the book from the author in exchange for an honest opinion. All opinions are my own.

I thought this book would be like Hillbilly Elegy or Educated. But it isn't. It's written in lots of short, staccato sentences. Like I have written this. With lots of italics. To really emphasize the profundity of the point the author is making. If you think you will find the writing style as annoying as I did then I would suggest giving this a swerve.

I was mesmerized by how Mary Marantz shared about her up bringing and how she embraced life and all it had for her. The author says, “Like most stories worth telling, it has hard parts, and I have done my best to make sure I’m not just relying on my own memory in telling them….The final draft is the truest version of my story that I have ever known, in large part because the people in these pages were willing to talk about both the beautiful…and the broken. For that, I am forever grateful.”

This author has had time to reflect on who God has made her to be, she says, “Here’s what I know: Those parts of us that we want to hide. Those parts of us that we wish we could bury below the surface far away from the light, praying for transformation. Those things we think will make people turn their faces away from us in some sort of sympathy shame on our behalf.”

“For better or worse, those things help make us who we are. We need to roll up our sleeves and get busy about the work of digging into that….Feel the hard ground break up and shake loose at our unflinching willingness to hold on. To look closer. To see what we didn’t see before.”

The author states that her story is one of redemption, and reconciliation with the roots that grew her, “a melody born out of the muddiest parts of my life.”…“Because as for me and my story…it always started with dirt.”

I was fascinated by her journey. I could not stop reading about Mary’s transformation from child to grown up and all the things she learned in-between. It was heart-wrenching in parts, inspiring in others, thought-provoking, transparent, beautiful and happy overall. I experienced a wide range of emotions in her story. This is a must read.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising”

Nora St. Laurent
TBCN Where Book Fun Begins!
The Book Club Network blog www.bookfun.org

Very interesting and beautifully told rags to success story! I don't usually read this type of book but I kept hearing about it and decided to try it. Mary does a great job of explaining in detail how she felt growing up poor in the mountains and also in a broken family. Gut wrenching and heart breaking in parts, it's a story about overcoming while still embracing your roots and also the role that faith played in her life. She has a flair for descriptions so vivd that you really picture yourself in her story. I sincerely hope she will write more books as I enjoy her writing style.

Dirt by Mary Marantz is a memoir that took me by surprise. I don't typically read spiritual memoirs, and was really nervous to dig into this one. But Marantz has written a beautiful and stunning memoir, full of memories from her time living in a trailer with her logger dad, to her time studying law at Yale. This book kind of reminds me of Educated. I'd highly recommend it for anyone to read - don't let the spiritual part bog you down.

Dirt
Growing Strong Roots in What Makes the Broken Beautiful
by Mary Marantz
Revell
Christian
Pub Date 15 Sep 2020


I am reviewing a copy of Dirt through Revell and Netgalley:


This book reminds us that it takes courage to chase a dream. Raw, unfettered, lionhearted, caution-to-the-wind courage. We need to have a level of bravery to reach for our dreams especially when circumstances seem to be against us.




Dirt is the story of places where we start. For Mary Marantz it was from a single wide trailer in the mountains of rural West Virgina, and then to the halls of Yale Law School. Mary Marantz reminds us of the importance of remembering our roots, while we turn our faces to the sky. She tells us of growing up in a trailer that smelled thick with mildew when it rained, she has known what it was like to feel as if she were broken or disqualified because of the Muddy Scars that left smudged footprints across life.





She talks of how generations of her lived and logged in those hauntingly treacherous woods, risking life and limb just to barely scrape by. And yet that very struggle became the redemption song God used to write a life she never dreamed of. Her story is not one of brokenness though, but one of hope and perseverance.






Dirt is a story of with, of heartwarming memories, but at its core it is a story of healing . Mary tells her story With gut-wrenching honesty and hard-won wisdom, Mary shares her story for anyone who has ever walked into the world and felt like their scars were still on display, showing that you are braver, better, and more empathetic for what you have survived.




I give Dirt five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!

Dirt is by far the very best book I’ve read in a long time. As soon as I read the last word, I wanted to start reading all over again. Mary Marantz is a rare talent, as evidenced by the amount of pages I’ve bookmarked with words worthy of quoting. When I read about her deepest scars all I could think were how hauntingly beautiful the words were. They made me feel a sense of peace about my own experience. Of all the moments this book made me cry, there were too many to count, it was the part about the butterfly that really hit me in a way I won’t soon forget. So many lives will be forever changed by this book. We are all broken in varying degrees throughout life. I believe Mary’s words will help heal even the deepest wounds.

I enjoyed Educated, The Glass Castle, and Hillbilly Elegy, and I thought this would be a similar memoir, chronicling someone reaching beyond the boundaries of poverty and managing to achieve a higher education. This book did that, but it was so much more. Mary Morantz is a brilliant writer, a philosopher, a psychologist, and a poet. She described the complicated relationship with her father in a way that only someone who is deeply introspective could do. I loved this book and am very grateful to NetGalley for the advanced copy. One of the best books I’ve read this year . . . maybe ever!

I’m going to try not to make this review sound too hyperbolic or overdramatic. But, I’ll warn you, it’s going to be difficult. Because this book was transformative and I already can’t wait to read it again when my hard copy arrives. I’ll start with a couple of my favorite quotes (and it’s VERY difficult to narrow down my many highlights).

“Here’s what I know: Those parts of us that we want to hide. Those parts of us that we wish we could bury below the surface far away from the light, praying for transformation. Those things we think will make people turn their faces away from us in some sort of sympathy shame on our behalf. For better or worse, those things help make us who we are.”

“The point is that we can’t browbeat people into giving their hearts to God. We can’t thump our chest and scream in their faces and twist their arms until they change their minds. Even if we could, that’s never how God wanted it. It was always meant to be a choice. A root change that happens in the heart. All we can do is sit cross-legged and open-hearted across from one another- close enough where we can really see each other- and tell our stories....’Stories change stories.’”

“Which means it can feel a whole lot like whiplash when God suddenly takes that hard, heavy story you’ve been trying so hard to hide all along and uses it to start opening doors you never dreamed of. Good. We need that kind of shake-up. Because the truth is, when we lean into this dirt that grew us, this struggle-turned-fertile-soil where our roots run deep, we stand a little taller. Open our arms a little wider. Turn our faces to the sky. Trade our shame-stories for a strength inside us we never knew we had. And decide once and for all to own all of it. The hard, the gritty, the bittersweet. This world may try to tell you it isn’t beautiful. But what if they’re wrong?”

“I thought that when He looked at my scars, he saw flaws. But the truth is, He just saw my story. And every little thing that was broken was a chance for him to make that story beautiful. Every wound was an opening for His light to get in. He sees it all, and He just reaches out again with His wide-open palms that have held me. I have been loved, I have been loved, I have been loved. And that, it turns out, changes everything.”

“We don’t skip the pain because that would be easier. We lean into it because that’s what love does.”

Well, those are only a few of my favorite passages. This is a memoir, but it is so much more than that. Mary’s story of feeling ashamed, the difficulty of accepting grace, the path to forgiveness, the transformation in the way that she viewed God, and the process through which she allowed herself to build a life apart from her home state while remaining true to the hard work and grit that helped make her who she is was inspiring, emotional, and challenging. So much of this book resonated with me and, like I said, I know I’ll be reading it again to absorb the depth and the beauty of her words again.

This is a story about reconciling with your roots and finding the beauty in broken places. Although repetitive in many places (examples below), Marantz certainly has a unique writing style. Readers of Ann Voskamp and Edie Wadsworth will likely think of both - particularly in the descriptions (dust like flecks of gold shimmering in the light etc.) and the southern roots. I don't know of another book quite like it and did want to keep turning the page to know what came next, but it needed a stronger focus and another round of editing for me.

Example 1 - Marantz says "_____ and that changed EVERYTHING." half a dozen times. How many times does everything change?
Example 2 - "Single-wide trailer" has at least a dozen mentions. Because Marantz can clearly weave a story with unique descriptions, repetition like this (and 7-8 phrases that were used 2-3 times each) quickly became frustrating. It would be a stronger book if the repeats were cut or changed.

"Dirt: Growing Strong Roots in What Makes the Broken Beautiful" is a memoir by Mary Marantz of growing up in the mountains of West Virginia. Knowing nothing about Ms. Marantz beforehand and after receiving an advanced reader's copy from Netgalley, I then read the wonderful prologue and before reading further on, then researched a bit more about the author. Learning more about the author heavily complimented the rest of the memoir because upon discovering more of Ms. Marantz's background, that knowledge created a keen interest to find out how she went from birth to the present.

"Dirt" is an exceptional memoir filled with obvious heartfelt memories, trying times and so many kernels of poignant life-long observations. Reading the memoir, the reader quickly realizes the author is wise beyond her years and writes lacking in wordiness and makes every word and description count. Another interesting aspect of the memoir is how "dirt" is expressed as a foundation for Ms. Marantz's life. And this is both in a physical and metaphorical sense. One example is how she points out one must dig deep into the dirt to discover the good. Her broad usage of the concept of "dirt" really ties the memoir together as a fibrous, branching system of life in the past, present and future, and how those things found in "dirt" heavily influence one's life.

Reading memoirs like "Dirt" I have found there is an almost delicate balance between whether the memoir may tend to lean toward pretentiousness or a somewhat superficiality feeling while losing sincerity and humility - Mary Marantz avoids that completely. Knowing where her life is in the present only makes the reader really appreciate her growth and all of her time before the present. If descriptions of her home life as a child do not move readers when contrasted to where she is today, then it is questionable as to what will.

I can't recommend "Dirt" enough. Mary Marantz has written an honest, touching memoir many will probably describe as a "rags to riches" story, when it is much more than that and as she writes of her father's fingernails and how he could never get the dirt from beneath his fingernails no matter how hard he tried, "Dirt" will remain under your fingernails after reading and that's not such a bad thing.

Netgalley provided an ARC of "Dirt" for the return of an honest review.