Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover
Reviewed by: Becky Houghton, Reference Assistant
Genre: Memoir
Suggested Age: Adults
What is this Book About? Tara Westover grows up in an isolated, survivalist mountain home in Idaho. Public school education, medical care and “ the government’s influence” were not allowed by her parents who prepared Tara and her older siblings for the “End Times” by stockpiling gasoline, home canned peaches, and other supplies including a “to go” bag for the final days of the world. Tara spent her childhood doing heavy manual labor in her father’s junkyard and assisting her mother in the preparation of herbal medications and midwife duties. At seventeen, Tara left home after studying on her own to pass the ACT exam and went to college at Brigham Young University in Utah. Tara not only completed an undergraduate degree, but went on to attend Oxford University in England and obtain a PhD from Harvard.
My Review: This was both a fascinating and horrifying story for me. The deprivation and abuse that Tara suffered in her youth from her family circumstances and her older brother are a strong testimony to the resilience of the human soul. Due to her family’s belief that conventional medicine, including basic vaccinations were unnecessary, numerous medical emergencies from lacerations from the junkyard to concussions and burns from explosions were treated with the herbal medications prepared by Tara’s mother. Education was from the few books, mainly Mormon histories, in her father’s library. Abuse by her older brother, Sean, who suffered from a mental and emotional disorder that her parents refused to acknowledge was one of the hardest parts of Tara’s life for me to read. Tara’s exposure to the conventional world at college was a difficult time for her (having never heard of the Holocaust or the Civil Rights Movement), but her desire to learn and obtain an education prevailed and her innate intelligence earned her the necessary financial resources to continue this learning. This was not an easy book to read. Sometimes I wanted to escape to a lighter, less poignant read, but I am glad to have completed the book. It was worth the effort. This is a true triumph of the human spirit.
Three Words That Describe This Book: Horrifying, Inspiring, Triumphant
Give it a Try if You Like: Wild by Cheryl Strayed or Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
Rating: 5/5
About FDL Reads
FDL Reads is a series of weekly book reviews from Fondulac District Library.
