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“Educated” by Tara Westover: A remarkably candid memoir about growing up survivalist

Posted by Mal Warwick | Memoir , Nonfiction | 0

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"Educated" by Tara Westover is about growing up among survivalists.

If you grew up in a comfortable middle-class home, as I did, you may be shocked by Tara Westover ‘s Educated , an account of her childhood and adolescence in a Mormon survivalist family in Idaho. I was. Again and again, I found my jaw dropping at the cruelty, ignorance, and superstition surrounding her. Yet Westover did far more than survive survivalists. Despite never attending school and receiving virtually no home-schooling, she has secured a PhD in intellectual history and political thought from Cambridge University . And two of her six siblings have PhDs as well. Her memoir, Educated , is an astonishing testament to the power of human potential.

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

A remarkably candid memoir about growing up among survivalists

As memoir, Educated is unusually honest. Westover portrays her father as what I would call a raving lunatic. The man would hold out for hour after hour about the evils of the government, the Illuminati, and the Medical Establishment. On one occasion one of his bad decisions led to a tragic car crash that grievously wounded Tara’s mother. On another, his stubborn refusal to follow simple safety procedures with dangerous machinery nearly killed Tara and one of her brothers. Much later, he caused an explosion that nearly killed him . In fact, she notes that his behavior suggests he is bipolar—and that couldn’t be more obvious from her account.

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover (2018) 336 pages ★★★★★

Here is what Westover’s father told her one evening about her decision to go to college. “‘The Lord has called me to testify,’ he said. ‘He is displeased. You have cast aside his blessings to whore after man’s knowledge. His wrath is stirred against you. It will not be long in coming.'”

But it’s not just her father who’s nuts. She details one incident after another involving one of her older brothers that make him out to be not just cruel and sadistic but dangerously violent as well.

A long, slow learning curve

Yet Westover is equally candid about her own failings. And her education into the ways of the world came slowly. She was sixteen before she began to learn much from any books other than the Book of Mormon and the Bible. In college at Brigham Young University, it was years before she learned to wash her hands after using the toilet. (“‘I teach them not to piss on their hands,'” her father said.) And even as a graduate student at Cambridge she was still learning how to relate successfully to other people.

Westover remained captive to the faith of her father even in college. “Not knowing for certain, but refusing to give way to those who claim certainty, was a privilege I had never allowed myself,” Westover writes. “My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute. It had never occurred to me that my voice might be as strong as theirs.”

“Learning in our family was entirely self-directed,” she explains. “[Y]ou could learn anything you could teach yourself, after your work was done. Some of us were more disciplined than others. I was one of the least disciplined, so that by the time I was ten, the only subject I had studied systematically was Morse code, because Dad insisted that I learn it.” He had somehow persuaded himself (and his family) that after civilization collapsed, they would be the only people capable of communicating. It wasn’t evident with whom they would communicate.

A powerful attraction to the land

In Educated , Tara Westover makes clear that her experience growing up was by no means all negative. For many years, and presumably to this day, she felt a powerful attraction to the land. “There’s a sense of sovereignty that comes from life on a mountain,” she writes, “a perception of privacy and isolation, even of dominion. In that vast space you can sail unaccompanied for hours, afloat on pine and brush and rock. It’s a tranquillity born of sheer immensity; it calms with its very magnitude, which renders the merely human of no consequence.”

Westover wrote this book at age twenty-nine. She was remarkably young to display such penetrating self-awareness. And her performance as a student both at Brigham Young University and at Cambridge makes clear that she is brilliant. That’s obvious in the book itself. She reveals, too, that she is a gifted singer. (One of the few ways she escaped total immersion in her family as a teenager was as a star in musical productions at a local theater.)

Educated was named one of the Ten Best Books of the Year by the New York Times Book Review and one of the best books of the year by many other publications. It is definitely that.

For related reading

You’ll find this book on The 40 best books of the decade from 2010-19.

You may also care to take a look at my post, 14 excellent memoirs . Top 10 nonfiction books about politics and 10 enlightening books about poverty in America might also be of interest.

And you can always find my most popular reviews, and the most recent ones, on the Home Page .

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Educated Is a Brutal, One-of-a-Kind Memoir

Tara Westover's coming-of-age story follows her upbringing in a survivalist family, and her decision to leave that life behind.

T ara Westover’s one-of-a-kind memoir is about the shaping of a mind, yet page after page describes the maiming of bodies—not just hers, but the heads, limbs, and torsos of her parents and six siblings, too. The youngest child in a fundamentalist Mormon family living in the foothills of Buck’s Peak, in Idaho, she grew up with a father fanatically determined to protect his family against the “brainwashing” world. Defending his isolated tribe against the physical dangers—literally brain-crushing in some cases—of the survivalist life he imposed was another matter.

Westover, who didn’t set foot in school until she left home in adolescence, toiled at salvaging scrap in his junkyard, awaiting the end days and/or the invading feds her father constantly warned of. Neither came. Nor, amazingly, did death or defeat, despite grisly accidents. Terrified, impaled, set on fire, smashed—the members of this clan learned that pain was the rule, not the exception. But succumbing was not an option, a lesson that ultimately proved liberating for Westover.

In briskly paced prose, she evokes a childhood that completely defined her. Yet it was also, she gradually sensed, deforming her. Baffled, inspired, tenaciously patient with her ignorance, she taught herself enough to take the ACT and enter Brigham Young University at 17. She went on to Cambridge University for a doctorate in history.

For Westover, now turning 32, the mind-opening odyssey is still fresh. So is the soul-wrenching ordeal—she hasn’t seen her parents in years—that isn’t over.

When you buy a book using a link on this page, we receive a commission. Thank you for supporting The Atlantic.

About the Author

“Educated,” by Tara Westover

I am far from the first critic to recommend Tara Westover’s astounding memoir, “ Educated ,” but if its comet tail of glowing reviews has not yet convinced you, let me see what I can do. Westover was born sometime in September, 1986—no birth certificate was issued—on a remote mountain in Idaho, the seventh child of Mormon survivalist parents who subscribed to a paranoid patchwork of beliefs well outside the mandates of their religion. The government was always about to invade; the End of Days was always at hand. Westover’s mother worked as a midwife and an herbal healer. Her father, who claimed prophetic powers, owned a scrap yard, where his children labored without the benefit of protective equipment. (Westover recounts accidents so hideous, and so frequent, that it’s a wonder she lived to tell her tale at all.) Mainstream medicine was mistrusted, as were schools, which meant that Westover’s determination to leave home and get a formal education—the choice that drives her book, and changed her life—amounted to a rebellion against her parents’ world.

This story, remarkable as it is, might be merely another entry in the subgenre of extreme American life, were it not for the uncommon perceptiveness of the person telling it. Westover examines her childhood with unsparing clarity, and, more startlingly, with curiosity and love, even for those who have seriously failed or wronged her. In part, this is a book about being a stranger in a strange land; Westover, adrift at university, can’t help but miss her mountain home. But her deeper subject is memory. Westover is careful to note the discrepancies between her own recollections and those of her relatives. (The ones who still speak to her, anyway. Her parents cut her off long ago.) “Part of me will always believe that my father’s words ought to be my own,” she writes. If her book is an act of defiance, a way to set the record of her own life straight, it’s also an attempt to understand, even to respect, those whom she had to break away from in order to get free.

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Reviews of Educated by Tara Westover

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Feb 20, 2018, 352 pages
Feb 2022, 368 pages

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Book Summary

Winner of the 2018 BookBrowse Nonfiction Award 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.

Chapter 1 Choose the Good

My strongest memory is not a memory. It's something I imagined, then came to remember as if it had happened. The memory was formed when I was five, just before I turned six, from a story my father told in such detail that I and my brothers and sister had each conjured our own cinematic version, with gunfire and shouts. Mine had crickets. That's the sound I hear as my family huddles in the kitchen, lights off, hiding from the Feds who've surrounded the house. A woman reaches for a glass of water and her silhouette is lighted by the moon. A shot echoes like the lash of a whip and she falls. In my memory it's always Mother who falls, and she has a baby in her arms. The baby doesn't make sense - I'm the youngest of my mother's seven children - but like I said, none of this happened. A year after my father told us that story, we gathered one evening to hear him read aloud from Isaiah, a prophecy about Immanuel. He sat on our ...

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

Many of Tara's father's choices have an obvious impact on Tara's life, but how did her mother's choices influence her? How did that change over time?
Tara's brother Tyler tells her to take the ACT. What motivates Tara to follow his advice?
Charles was Tara's first window into the outside world. Under his influence, Tara begins to dress differently and takes medicine for the first time. Discuss Tara's conflicting admiration for both Charles and her father.
Tara has titled her book Educated and much of her education takes place in classrooms, lectures, or other university environments. But not all. What other important moments of "education" were there? What friends, acquaintances, or experiences had ...
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Reader reviews, bookbrowse review.

Westover's incredible story is about testing the limits of perseverance and sanity. Her father may have been a survivalist, but her psychic survival is the most impressive outcome here. Although this memoir represents Westover's own perspective, she strives to be rational and charitable by questioning her own memory and interpretation of events, often looking for outside confirmation from other family members who witnessed the same events. This is one of the most powerful and well-written memoirs I've ever read... continued

Full Review (807 words) This review is available to non-members for a limited time. For full access, become a member today .

(Reviewed by Rebecca Foster ).

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Beyond the Book

Educated author Tara Westover's Idaho family runs Butterfly Express , a successful business selling essential oils and other herbal remedies. Her mother, LaRee Westover, trains herbalists and is the author of a book on herbalism, Butterfly Miracles with Essential Oils . Throughout her childhood, Westover was treated with foraged herbs instead of pharmaceuticals. "For as long as I could remember, whenever I was in pain, whether from a cut or a toothache, Mother would make a tincture of lobelia and skullcap," she writes. "It had never lessened the pain, not one degree. Because of this, I had come to respect pain, even revere it, as necessary and untouchable." It wasn't until she was in college that she tried painkiller pills for the first time....

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educated tara westover book review family response

By Tara Westover

Book review, full book summary and synopsis for Educated by Tara Westover, a personal journey about a childhood in a survivalist home.

Educated is a memoir by Tara Westover, a woman who grows up as the youngest of seven in a rural Idaho Mormon community. She and her siblings were all born at home and are homeschooled, and her parents are deeply suspicious of the government. Her father fears the influence of the Illuminati, thought that Y2K would be the harbinger of the Second Coming, and believes public education standards are just brainwashing.

The story is told in three parts. Part One details her childhood. Westover describes her father's radicalization and the many serious (and often gruesome) injuries that her family members refuse to get medial treatment for.

In Part Two, Westover ventures to college at BYU. She describes the culture shock of being confused about what the Holocaust was or having to learn about slavery, and she struggles through her first romantic relationship. Finally in Part Three, Westover goes to Cambridge for her PhD, attempts to confront her family about their issues and brings us up to date with her life now.

(The Full Plot Summary is also available, below)

Full Plot Summary

Tara Westover grows up with in an unconventional way (no birth certificates, no medical records, etc.). She and her siblings have been raised on a mountaintop in Idaho.

Her family lives in a Mormon community, and her father, Gene , is a survivalist. He believes in self-sufficiency. His dogma becomes entrenched after an incident where the neighbors were attacked by the government. Her mother, Faye , is the town’s midwife, a practice that is illegal in Idaho. Faye had a very normal upbringing, and Tara believes Faye married Gene as rebellion against it.

Tara and her sibling don't have proper schooling, medical care and the like. When Faye is in a serious accident during the move to Idaho, she doesn't receive medical treatment, and she has chronic headaches after that. Gene is against schooling, but Tara’s oldest brother Tyler ends up going to college anyway. Tara decides she needs to go, too.

Tara also recalls an incident where her brother Luke gets burned, though he family’s recollection of what happened is all different. It's one of many incidences where there's discrepancies among her family about what happened growing up. When Y2K approaches, Gene starts getting preoccupied with preparing for Y2K and is depressed when nothing happens.

Tara has a caring relationship with her brother Shawn in some ways, but Shawn also has a dangerousness to him, and he can be mean, controlling, physically and emotionally abusive and violent. Meanwhile, Tyler encourages Tara to go to college. Young Tara wants to change her life. She takes the ACT and is accepted into BYU. Her father is firmly against it and continues to be volatile and dangerous. Her mother and other family members discreetly try to encourage her.

At BYU, Tara settles into her new, strange life. She experiences culture shock as well as difficulties in school since she is far behind the other students going in. When Tara returns home for the summer, she starts hanging out with a boy from town, Charles , and starts to see her previous life as being a little backwards. Gene and Shawn think she’s become "uppity" and call her names. Tara gets a headache, Charles gives her an ibuprofen, and Tara is shocked to experience medicine that actually works (as opposed to the home remedies she's accustomed to).

She's also stressed from financial and academic pressures, and her friends have to help her with her personal hygiene. When Charles visits her home sees the hostile, abusive environment, he feels in over his head and breaks things off with her. The church Bishop at school is supportive of Tara and tries to help her with her. He encourages her to apply for a grant, which later comes through.

During an introductory psychology course, Tara realizes that Gene likely has bipolar disorder. She starts learns the truth of the event (Ruby Ridge incident) from child. It was a drug raid, but Gene had believed the government attacked that family for their beliefs. Meanwhile, at home, Gene gets into a bad accident, and the family cares for him for weeks. When he finally heals, it strengthens Faye and Gene's beliefs that traditional medical treatment is unnecessary.

Tara decides to study abroad at Cambridge. Her professor takes an interest in her and encourages to believe in herself. When she graduates, she decides to pursue a Master’s Degree at Cambridge. As Tara begins her PhD program and after more culture shock, Tara finally starts feeling like she’s fitting in at Cambridge. On the home front, she also attempts to confront her family about Shawn's behavior. Audrey and Tara discuss Shawn's abusive behavior, but it results in more violent and angry outbursts from Shawn. When nothing changes, Tara talks to her father who refuses to believe her, and Faye tries to convince Tara her memories are wrong. Shawn says he's cutting Tara out of his life, and soon Audrey recants and cuts Tara out as well.

Tara finally tells them goodbye and walks out. Tara’s work on her PhD suffers, but she’s able to get back on track when Tyler surprisingly supports her. Tara gets her PhD. In the final chapters, Tara goes home after a long absence, but has not reconciled with her parents.

The book ends with Tara reflecting on her fractured family. When Faye's mother passes away, Tara goes to the funeral, but sits apart from them. Shawn does not look at Tara during the service. As of the publication of the book many years later, the funeral is the last time Tara has seen her parents.

For more detail, see the full Section-by-Section Summary .

If this summary was useful to you, please consider supporting this site by leaving a tip ( $2 , $3 , or $5 ) or joining the Patreon !

Book Review

Educated , by Tara Westover, was one of the bestselling books on 2018 and has continued to top the charts even now, despite being released over a year ago. I put it on my to-read list thanks to Bill Gate’s book blog , and Ellen Degeneres read it after Michelle Obama recommended it to her.

Point is, if you’re reading this book, at least you know you’re in good company.

( Update 8/2020 : LaRee Westover — “Faye” in the book, the mother of Tara Westover, has written a book called “Educating” that’s partially a response to Educated. She’s crowdfunding it on Indiegogo . )

Educated opens with an episode from Westover’s childhood. She is six years old. As it was explained to her, a nearby family, the Weavers, has been under siege and shot at by the government for being “freedom fighters,” resulting in the deaths of the mom and a 14-year-old boy. (In reality, the Weavers were in a raid gone awry for possessing illegal weapons .) It’s a formative experience, marking the point where her father starts to transform into a radicalized survivalist, and Westover wonders in the book a few times what he would have been like if she’d known him before that.

Westover writes that “four of my parents’ seven children don’t have birth certificates. We have no medical records because we were born at home and have never seen a doctor or nurse. We have no school records because we’ve never set foot in a classroom.”

Author Tara Westover

The Good Stuff

Educated is a fascinating book on multiple levels. As a personal journey for Westover, it’s triumphant and hopeful. Westover goes from receiving very little education to eventually getting her PhD at Cambridge.

As a story, it’s unique. Westover’s experiences make for a distinctive perspective, accented with colorful anecdotes.

And as a reader, it’s interesting to consider how her perspective is shaped by the usual fallacies of memory and perspective.

For example, as I was reading, I wondered if the event she describes in the first chapter was as dramatic as she believes, or if the drama of it was heightened by being told about it at a young age and slowly building a mythos out of it. How would she have viewed her father if no one had ever later described the scene to her?

Some Criticisms and Caveats

To be honest, Educated is not the type of book I would’ve selected if it weren’t for its overwhelming popularity. It’s highly personal and not a topic I’m particularly interested in. But the story was compelling enough that I found myself invested in it, even if it did drag in a few parts.

I couldn’t help feeling, though, that perhaps Westover wrote this book too soon. It seems like the story we’re reading is the one she’s constructed to make sense of everything that happened to her, but I imagine she still has a longer journey to really process it all and what it means.

Some parts of the book, especially when it comes to her own behavior seem too neat and tidy to be the whole story. When her father offers her a blessing, she responds “I love you. But I can’t. I’m sorry, Dad” and he just walks out of the room. Scenes like that feel more like a made-for-TV movie than the truth.

When the book concludes, things are essentially unresolved with her family. I would be surprised if that’s where their story ends, even if they made some big mistakes.

Educated vs. Hillbilly Elegy

There have been a number of comparisons of Educated with J.D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy , but they’re fairly different books. Hillbilly Elegy is a much more political book that’s trying to explain the economic conditions impacting white working-class Appalachian communities. Meanwhile, though Westover’s memoir involves a family that is geographically rooted in Trumpland, her story isn’t meant to be representative of Trump voters or even of her Mormon community in Southern Idaho.

Westover’s father has more radical views than most in their religious community. He firmly believes women shouldn’t work, and he’s a survivalist, busy hoarding food and being paranoid about potential attacks from the government and whatnot. Westover discusses how he likely has an untreated personality disorder.

Read it or Skip It?

I enjoyed parts of Educated. It’s an inherently interesting story, and one that’s worth telling.

It’s not a book I would have normally chosen for myself if it weren’t for all the glowing endorsements, but I’m glad I gave it a shot. For me, it didn’t quite live up to the hype, but I do feel like I got something out of her story.

Have you read this book or would you consider reading it? See Educated on Amazon .

Tara Westover’s Family and Responses to Educated

I went through a lot of the comments that her family has made publicly (on Facebook, Amazon, and Goodreads, etc.) about the book, and it seems Westover’s family members have been vocal about their disagreement (“lies”, according to them) with some of the parts of the book. However, throughout Educated, Westover often acknowledges the question marks in her memories, and it seems like they mostly take issue with the overall portrayal as opposed to disputing specific facts.

To be fair, it does seem like her family members are not quite the bumpkins she makes them out to be. At one point in the book, her mom has to force her dad’s hand in getting a phone line installed, for example. However, in reality they don’t seem as backwards — they run a business and are pretty active on Facebook and whatnot. Her mom comments frequently on the book.

Tara gives many of her family monikers in the book, but in actuality her parents are Val (“ Gene “) and LaRee Westover (“ Faye “). “Shawn” is the nickname for Travis. (Tyle, Richard and Luke Westover are referred to by their actual names in the book.) Her older sister Valaree (“ Audrey “) and her mother run an essential oils business together. It has a Facebook , Instagram and even a YouTube channel. They even sell a book about essential oils . The family’s lawyer claims it has 30 employees, multiple facilities and relies on an automated assembly line ( PDF version in case that link goes down).

On the other hand, it’s worth mentioning that her brother — or at least someone claiming to be him — Tyler (real name) has come out with extensive comments that don’t seem to contradict the book. He noted some inaccuracies in her perceptions ( PDF version ), but seems to corroborate large parts of the story. Also, Richard (also his real name)’s profile on his university’s website ( PDF version ) corroborates the spotty education they received as kids: “Westover said he is probably the only ISU masters-level chemist who had to start with a beginning math course at ISU.”

In the comments of one of the articles linked above, Richard Westover has also responded to the book with the following:

“The relationship between my sister and my parents, like that of many poeple, is more complicated than either this article or the book can portray. Tara is doing the best she can with what she knows and I give her kudos as well for that. I think people reading either the book or the article should suspend judgement. Having read both, and lived through it as well, I would not consider myself in possesion of the facts tsufficient to pass judgement to the extent many of the commenters seem to be willing to do. To you it is a book and it is cheap to rant about it. To me, it is my life and I’m still living it. Tara comes to my house to visit occasionally and I still call my parents every week.”

Important Note : While they seem to want to share their side of the story, its seems sad that many people have taken that as an invitation to harass her family. As a reminder, they’re private citizens responding to a story about themselves. John Oliver did a fantastic piece on public shaming . He discusses how it’s often a useful tool, but also how it can be abused. I hope no one reads this book and thinks that the main takeaway should be “I need to go harass these private citizens / people I don’t know RIGHT NOW.”

Book Excerpt

Read the first pages of Educated

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48 comments

Share your thoughts cancel reply.

Great review!!

thank you! and thanks for dropping by!

I really liked Educated but I see what you mean by saying there will probably be more to the story. Really thorough review!

I can see why people liked it so much for sure, I think I probably had unrealistic expectations reading it this late in the game — thanks for dropping by!

Great review of the book, both of its attributes and its faults. I think the book treads an often invisible line of reporting memories versus reporting facts, and I appreciated that Westover was open about the possibility that the two might not be the same for her. The book really spoke to me as an educator who possesses a fair amount of privilege, but I think we can all learn something about the importance of not writing people off as lost causes simply because they are ignorant. I’m glad you found some value in her story, even if you didn’t love it. (It’s so easy to be disappointed by such great hype!)

Thank you, Veronica! I agree, I liked that she is really open about admitting that she’s only recounting her memories of what happened. And yes! I think it’s so true that there’s a lot of valuable lessons to be learned from her story. I’m glad people are reading it. Honestly, I think it’s just in certain parts where I knew where the story was headed (I’d heard her talk about the book before reading it, etc.), I got a little bit bored once I sort of had the gist of what was going on (but I think that’s just my own impatience). Plus with all the hype, I had like CRAZY expectations, haha. Thank you for your insightful comments!

Loved the review!

Thank you! And thanks for reading!

Great review. You really dug into the background. You made some good points about how soon this was written after. I do usually think it takes some time to make sense of our past.

Thank you catherine!

Terrific review, thanks

thank you! :)

very nice review!!

thank you very much! :)

I heard about this book. I need to read it but I fear it might break my heart before I get to the end so I have to gear myself up for it. Really a well-written write/up. I hope the author sees your post.

Thank you so much and thanks for reading!

Very thoughtful review. Thanks!

Thank you, much appreciated!

Great review! I have been wanting to read this book for so long now, but just end up choosing something else always for some reason.

Thank you! Hope you enjoy it if you get a chance to read it!

The waitlist for this book is nuts. I feel like I’ve been waiting forever. I love stories about people who grow up in unusual situations, so I think I’ll like this one. Great review!

oh yes, if that’s what interests you, I definitely think you should read it! Thanks for dropping by! Hope you get off the waitlist soon! :)

Been thinking about reading this one for a while now, thank you for the great review!

thank you! hope you like it if you get a chance to read it!

Excellent review! Although it’s not a book I would usually be drawn to, your review made me curious enough to give it a try.

That’s great to hear, thank you!

Your review of Educated was the most honest of all the ones I’ve read. Thank you!

Are Educated and Hillbilly Elegy novels? I thought they were biographical memoirs and considered non fiction. maybe that’s where people get caught up in trying to find out if it’s true or not. If it’s a novel, then just take as a story, not the truth.

I can’t wait to read it.

Fantastic articulation of a story that has something for everyone. With or without the abusive factor, I felt she told her story in a way that would benefit anyone’s family situation. The abusive factors, the dangers inherent in the working situations she experienced as a child, only added to our insights into these relationships. So many episodes in the book gave me personal emotions, but one favorite scene is when Tara is on the rooftop in england with her professor and her classmates. The wind is fierce and would scare anyone. Tara walks up to edge of roof, standing as if there is no wind and has no fear. Her professor comes near her and observes how her classmates are huddled together in the middle of the roof, bent forward and facing sideways so the wind won’t sweep them away. Tara, for all her differences growing up, stands like a superman in front of the other girls.

Her stories, like the roof scene, weave together a larger story of a life filled with unique experiences that might bring anyone to their knees. She survives all this in such a way that she shows all of us that, if we stick to it and really try, we can be supermen, too. Thank you, Tara, for sharing your love and strength. Beautiful book.

I enjoyed your review until you commented that the crazy Westover’s radical beliefs were firmly in Trumpland. Really?? What on earth do their views have to do with the average Trump supporter? You, obviously have no idea.

Hi Karen, I write in the review that their family is located in Trumpland (as in, located in an area where people generally support Trump) but their beliefs are NOT representative and are actually considered extreme, even for their community.

Hope this clears things up. Best, Jenn

Loved the book but very upset with the people in Preston. Why didn’t they step in to help her and why didn’t someone do something about “Shawn”? Preston is a small town where everyone knows everyone’s business. I know as I grew up in several small towns in southern Idaho. I admire Tara with what she has down with her life.

I was impressed with the book because I personally relate to it. Like Tara, I lacked a high school education and BYU gave me a chance no one else would have. I am even more impressed when I have listened to her interviews. She is in the same position that I have been my entire life. I know good people on both sides of our divided country and we desperately need intelligent people like Tara to be able to discourse with both side and bring reason to our crumbling society.

I agree with Karen. Labeling an area of the country “Trumpland” reeks of a kind of racism. Albeit not the most common kind, but in my opinion still shows ignorance. Trump has actually gotten some pretty important things done in our country. Do your research.

How would it be racism, also read the reviewers reply, it clears up what she meant

I read this a few years ago, right after it came out. Her mother is releasing her side of the story this coming year and I just pre-ordered it. I own one of LaRee’s books already, and buy her products on a regular basis. Her mother is nothing short of incredible, even if her father is possibly insane. Because of LaRee’s new book, I have revisited Tara’s book. This review is much better than most of the reviews I have read, and interviews I have watched. Thank you for that. I am very frustrated at most readers’ inability to see what this book is about. It is not about “Mormonism” or homeschooling or education or natural medicine at all. It is about mental illness and abuse. Her focus on being off the grid, Mormon, and homeschooled or unschooled takes away from the real story. I feel like all of the interviews I have watched have focused on the fact that she was born at home, unschooled (which is what she was, yet no one has done enough research before an interview to name it as such), and never went to the doctor. There are a great many families that practice natural medicine and unschool that don’t need her form of “education”. I unschool my children, practice natural medicine and am a Latter Day Saint. We also live in Idaho and are self employed. I have many friends who choose the same lifestyle. However, my children are very confident, know they are safe and loved, and have had very magical childhoods free from the pressures of school. So far we have one college graduate. We belong to several homeschool groups and have a rich life free from the restraint of the mainstream. She generalizes the the movements that she attacks. Her interviews make me sick. She ignores the horrible parts of her life in the book and focuses on the lack of “education”. Her unschooling and being un-vaxed had nothing to do with her trauma. Thank you for focusing on the trauma and seeing the book for what it truly is.

I just finished Educated and it was great. It is hard to believe what some children have to live through to become adults. It appears to me that Tara has done a great job of raising and educating herself. She reminds me of Jeanette Walls from the Glass Castle. Great informative review.

I just finished the book last night and your review was spot on. I didn’t think I would get into it the way I did but it definitely held my interest

An interesting review. As a child of an emotionally abusive parent (who now swears she doesn’t remember half of the things her kids recount to her) I can easily see where the disconnect between Tara and her parents’ narrative lies. As a child we miss intention behind parents’ action. As a parent we miss the impact. The truth likely lies somewhere in between. But – and this is obviously a bias of my own experience – I know I believe none of her story was concocted.

Hey, thanks for your thoughts. That’s definitely a useful perspective to consider as well. I appreciate you sharing your comment!

I just finished the book and so appreciate d Tara’s story. This is a personal account of one person’s struggle to understand, deal with and overcome abuse from within a family. Is is fair for any of us to judge her journey through this? Why does it matter? I commend this young woman for examining herself, her life and her worth in it. Her willingness to offer this story to anyone who may need to hear it is truly a gift. If it speaks to you in some way, drink it in. If not, let it pass over you. This is art.

thank you for this post! i love it

thanks umi!

Hi and thank you for inviting my thoughts here. Having a little extra time on my hands recently has allowed me to revisit some of the themes explored in Educated. It’s funny because I recently sought out some perspectives on the book from a few sites. Bill Gates’ perspective mostly focuses on Tara’s ability to be self taught. He emphasizes how impressive Tara is and rightly so. Having been brought up without access to any sort of education, her tenacity and intrinsic motivation to learn and become educated are truly mind-blowing. And as important as this particular theme is to both Tara personally, and the theme of education itself, it is not what made me consider Educated over and over for the past year.

The other theme, as many of you may know, is mental illness and how it can truly destroy family members, and eventually destroy not just the family dynamic, but the family as a permanent institution. Along with the mental illness and abuse, I found myself personally recognizing and feeling a very sad connection to the constant denial and enabling, as well as the crushing betrayal and eventual decision on Tara’s part to break ties with family members. This is where I really connected with Tara. If there were a support group for people who have either been abandoned by family members or who have been forced to end relationships with family members, I think maybe people like Tara and I would truly benefit. From my perspective, it’s your worst nightmare. You never really make a clean break from even the most mentally ill and/or abusive siblings. You think about them and worry about them, even though you know there’s nothing left that you can do. It is a pain that is truly debilitating. I sincerely thank Tara for the time and hard work that went into sharing her story. No one likes to feel that they are the only one who has ever experienced a particular kind of tragic loss. There are support groups for grieving, but not for this kind of grief. Alas, Educated helped me to see that I am not walking this path alone. For some of us, family is not forever.

Tara Westover’s story is extraordinary. It is remarkable that three of the off spring went on to receive PhDs.. It is sad and disturbing that “Shawn” never received the mental help he needed. There is a thread if mental illness that runs through the family.. Congrats to Tara for overcoming such difficulties. I think there may be more to come.

This was my first book of 2022. It was eye-opening for me to say the least. While I think it is told from Tara’s perspective, I wish to remind everyone that for a person to share the truth of their family life requires great courage and is often sugar coated. It is an extremely difficult thing to do. Thank you Tara for being so brave. Your courage has given me strength 🙏🏻

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Awards & Accolades

Our Verdict

New York Times Bestseller

IndieBound Bestseller

National Book Critics Circle Finalist

by Tara Westover ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 20, 2018

An astonishing account of deprivation, confusion, survival, and success.

A recent Cambridge University doctorate debuts with a wrenching account of her childhood and youth in a strict Mormon family in a remote region of Idaho.

It’s difficult to imagine a young woman who, in her teens, hadn’t heard of the World Trade Center, the Holocaust, and virtually everything having to do with arts and popular culture. But so it was, as Westover chronicles here in fairly chronological fashion. In some ways, the author’s father was a classic anti-government paranoiac—when Y2K failed to bring the end of the world, as he’d predicted, he was briefly humbled. Her mother, though supportive at times, remained true to her beliefs about the subordinate roles of women. One brother was horrendously abusive to the author and a sister, but the parents didn’t do much about it. Westover didn’t go to public school and never received professional medical care or vaccinations. She worked in a junkyard with her father, whose fortunes rose and fell and rose again when his wife struck it rich selling homeopathic remedies. She remained profoundly ignorant about most things, but she liked to read. A brother went to Brigham Young University, and the author eventually did, too. Then, with the encouragement of professors, she ended up at Cambridge and Harvard, where she excelled—though she includes a stark account of her near breakdown while working on her doctoral dissertation. We learn about a third of the way through the book that she kept journals, but she is a bit vague about a few things. How, for example, did her family pay for the professional medical treatment of severe injuries that several of them experienced? And—with some justification—she is quick to praise herself and to quote the praise of others.

Pub Date: Feb. 20, 2018

ISBN: 978-0-399-59050-4

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2017

BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR

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SEEN & HEARD

PERSPECTIVES

THE 48 LAWS OF POWER

by Robert Greene ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1998

If the authors are serious, this is a silly, distasteful book. If they are not, it’s a brilliant satire.

The authors have created a sort of anti-Book of Virtues in this encyclopedic compendium of the ways and means of power.

Everyone wants power and everyone is in a constant duplicitous game to gain more power at the expense of others, according to Greene, a screenwriter and former editor at Esquire (Elffers, a book packager, designed the volume, with its attractive marginalia). We live today as courtiers once did in royal courts: we must appear civil while attempting to crush all those around us. This power game can be played well or poorly, and in these 48 laws culled from the history and wisdom of the world’s greatest power players are the rules that must be followed to win. These laws boil down to being as ruthless, selfish, manipulative, and deceitful as possible. Each law, however, gets its own chapter: “Conceal Your Intentions,” “Always Say Less Than Necessary,” “Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy,” and so on. Each chapter is conveniently broken down into sections on what happened to those who transgressed or observed the particular law, the key elements in this law, and ways to defensively reverse this law when it’s used against you. Quotations in the margins amplify the lesson being taught. While compelling in the way an auto accident might be, the book is simply nonsense. Rules often contradict each other. We are told, for instance, to “be conspicuous at all cost,” then told to “behave like others.” More seriously, Greene never really defines “power,” and he merely asserts, rather than offers evidence for, the Hobbesian world of all against all in which he insists we live. The world may be like this at times, but often it isn’t. To ask why this is so would be a far more useful project.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998

ISBN: 0-670-88146-5

Page Count: 430

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1998

GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | PHILOSOPHY & RELIGION | PSYCHOLOGY | HISTORICAL & MILITARY

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BOOK REVIEW

by Robert Greene

BOOK TO SCREEN

INTO THE WILD

by Jon Krakauer ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1996

A wonderful page-turner written with humility, immediacy, and great style. Nothing came cheap and easy to McCandless, nor...

The excruciating story of a young man on a quest for knowledge and experience, a search that eventually cooked his goose, told with the flair of a seasoned investigative reporter by Outside magazine contributing editor Krakauer (Eiger Dreams, 1990).

Chris McCandless loved the road, the unadorned life, the Tolstoyan call to asceticism. After graduating college, he took off on another of his long destinationless journeys, this time cutting all contact with his family and changing his name to Alex Supertramp. He was a gent of strong opinions, and he shared them with those he met: "You must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life''; "be nomadic.'' Ultimately, in 1992, his terms got him into mortal trouble when he ran up against something—the Alaskan wild—that didn't give a hoot about Supertramp's worldview; his decomposed corpse was found 16 weeks after he entered the bush. Many people felt McCandless was just a hubris-laden jerk with a death wish (he had discarded his map before going into the wild and brought no food but a bag of rice). Krakauer thought not. Admitting an interest that bordered on obsession, he dug deep into McCandless's life. He found a willful, reckless, moody boyhood; an ugly little secret that sundered the relationship between father and son; a moral absolutism that agitated the young man's soul and drove him to extremes; but he was no more a nutcase than other pilgrims. Writing in supple, electric prose, Krakauer tries to make sense of McCandless (while scrupulously avoiding off-the-rack psychoanalysis): his risky behavior and the rites associated with it, his asceticism, his love of wide open spaces, the flights of his soul.

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1996

ISBN: 0-679-42850-X

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Villard

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1995

GENERAL BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR | BIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR

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by Jon Krakauer

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Educated by Tara Westover

Publisher: Random House | Genre: Memoir, coming-of-age tale

Title: Educated

Author: Tara Westover

Publisher: Random House

Genre: Memoir, coming-of-age tale

First Publication: 2018

Language: English

Major Characters: Tara Westover, Gene Westover (Her Dad), Faye Westover (Her Mother), Shawn Westover, Charles, Professor Steinberg

Theme: Memory, History, and Subjectivity; Learning and Education; Devoutness and Delusion; Family, Abuse, and Entrapment

Setting: Idaho, Utah, Cambridge

Narration: First person

Book Summary: Educated by Tara Westover

Tara Westover was 17 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 in her father’s junkyard.

Her father forbade hospitals, 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 one of Tara’s older brothers became violent.

Then, lacking any formal education, Tara began to educate herself. She taught herself enough mathematics and grammar to be admitted to Brigham Young University, where she studied history, learning for the first time about important 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. 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 of Tara Westover. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty and of the grief that comes with severing the closest of ties. 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.

Book Review: Educated by Tara Westover

Educated by Tara Westover is an anguished story about growing up in the mountains of Idaho in a fundamentalist Mormon/survivalist family led by a father convinced that the socialist government in every respect was evil. As a family they prepared for “The Days of Abomination” and saw the opposition as The Illuminati. They lived pretty much “off the grid” for a long time—birthing at home (Tara’s mom is a midwife and herbalist; her Dad ran a junkyard). They had no birth certificates, no social security numbers, went to no doctors, had no contact with any media, and had no public schooling at all.

In the mountains she was defined largely by her father and brother, Sean, who were abusive, and throughout she painfully struggles with how to honor her father and his narrow, paranoid version of the world as she learned everything that was largely denied her.

“I believed then–and part of me will always believe–that my father’s words ought to be my own.”

This was a well-written, gripping story, and I never read these kinds of stories but it was highly reviewed and much awarded so I thought I would try it and am glad I did. But it was also really uncomfortable to read. It weighed on me as I read it. I thought of largely discredited memoirs and wondered if this would become one of those, as her story is hard to fathom–both the horrific parts and the successful parts–her escape is almost unbelievable.

She also has what she describes as a nervous breakdown at one point as her family thought she was evil and dangerous for not following her father’s dictates to live in the home and (dangerously) work for him as a scrapper. Her father is crazy and her brother Sean is crazy-violent, threatening to kill her, and no one agrees with her side of the story. A nightmare. And though she escapes this world, she never is entirely happy, as she loses her family—such as it is–in the process.

“You can love someone and still choose to say goodbye to them,” she says now. “You can miss a person every day, and still be glad that they are no longer in your life.”

In her view, her mother, forced to become an unlicensed midwife by her husband, was a tower of womanly strength, devoted to her bipolar, authoritarian husband. The family had to bow to his will, paralysed by his delusions, or leave, and she eventually left. One trigger for Westover’s father, as it was for many survivalists then, was a paranoid interpretation of the Ruby Ridge “killing” of Randy Weaver, another survivalist. Early on, Dad interpreted the Holy Bible as telling him that, for instance, milk was sinful and they only used molasses and honey thereafter. He was crazy in so many ways, and only Tara had the strength to finally tell the truth about him and her brother. Everyone else in her family bowed down to him.

Tara Westover, almost unbelievably not only graduated from BYU, but went on to graduate with a PhD in History from Cambridge, becoming truly “educated” about herself, her family, and the world. At Cambridge a Dr. Kerry attempts to cure her of her impostor syndrome, recognizing her special talents and writer and thinker.

“My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute. It had never occurred to me that my voice might be as strong as theirs.”

This book resonates with present time in the world where white supremacism, separatism, survivalism, fundamentalism, sexism, and mental derangement seem to be ascendant. At the university, in her first class she only had heard the name—Shakespeare, but had to drop it because it was a senior level course. She learned from a roommate that the reason she failed the midterm in Art History is that she had to actually read the textbook. She had never been in school of any kind!

In the university she learned of the Holocaust and slavery, really for the first time; she learned of bipolar disorder, paranoid schizophrenia, she learned of antibiotics and went to a doctor for the first time, she accepted a student grant from the government, all socialist acts her family knew the university and the government would corrupt her with. That she keeps going home where she has been threatened and hurt and lied to resonates with familiar abuse scenarios. But ultimately she finds the courage to go with her new life and not her old one.

I thought that The Glass Castle was the ultimate memoir for dangerous and negligent parenting, but Westover has managed to swipe that unwanted crown. Westover has a uniquely compelling, incredibly harrowing survival story – survival of religious fundamentalism, survival of emotional and physical abuse, survival of being thrown like a fish onto dry land into a world about which she knew nothing. That she not only survived but excelled in this world, studying at Harvard and receiving a Ph.D. from Cambridge, is a testament to her intellectual gifts as well as her courage. And as this memoir makes clear, an inborn talent for exceptional writing doesn’t hurt either.

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Title: Educated

Author: Tara Westover

Publisher: Random House

Genre: Memoir, coming-of-age tale

First Publication: 2018

Language: English

Major Characters: Tara Westover, Gene Westover (Her Dad), Faye Westover (Her Mother), Shawn Westover, Charles, Professor Steinberg

Theme: Memory, History, and Subjectivity; Learning and Education; Devoutness and Delusion; Family, Abuse, and Entrapment

Setting: Idaho, Utah, Cambridge

Narration: First person

Book Summary: Educated by Tara Westover

Book Review: Educated by Tara Westover

Educated is a memoir of the growing up of Tara Westover. The book is split into three parts: growing up and her childhood; College, predominantly at BYU; and, further education and the cracking of familial relationships. This book, I found, was largely an exploration of her familial relationships and the empowerment of education.

This memoir starts off in Bucks Peak , where Tara grows up on the mountain, which was presented as very picturesque in writing. Without seeing pictures of the place, you could imagine the junkyard Tara use to play and work in, the animals roaming the sides of the mountain, her numerous siblings all playing around and living under her father’s roof.

“It’s strange how you give the people you love so much power over you.”

Tara’s father is a prominent figure in this memoir; a fundamentalist Mormon, he teaches the Mormon book as gospel and is incredibly strict in his teachings. He also states how he receives messages from God and all events in the world are leading up to The End of Days, the end of the world and so he ruthlessly enlists the help of his children and wife to prepare for this impending doom (this includes storing food and trying to dig a waterline into the mountain). Besides these views of grandeur, her father is also manipulative and often deceitful to achieve what he wants. He also has a very misogynistic view of what women should and shouldn’t be, how they should dress, etc.

Throughout childhood you see Tara complying with these ideals (for example, judging women on the length of their skirts if they are above the ankle). She doesn’t know any other way of thinking or critical thought as this is the only way she has been taught to think. She never attends school and is taught to reject societal conventions and to judge others who are unlike her, to see them as wrong.

“We are all of us more complicated than the roles we are assigned in the stories other people tell”

Tara also has to deal with an abusive and dangerous family member, her brother. He is incredibly manipulative and deceptive and uses violence. You watch her journey through self doubt and self blame, and even when she does accept it,. her family members turn a blind eye. These parts of the book were uncomfortable to read.

Through attending BYU and onto Cambridge for her doctorate, you find Tara developing as a person, but also admitting the strain between her life on the junkyard and her life at prestigious institutions in education. The gap between family and education broadens and conflicts her mind. Through education, she was empowered and her transformation was courageous. She is absolutely remarkably smart despite the containment of her family values causing her severe mental health problems. She develops critical thinking and analysis of her own life, freeing herself from the confines of her father’s teaching. The great thing about Educated by Tara Westover is that, despite her conflicts with certain family members, she was able to develop and create new familial relationships with others, leading to loving and trusting relationships.

“I began to experience the most powerful advantage of money: the ability to think of things besides money.”

Educated by Tara Westover was lyrical in prose and read as incredibly smart. From the outset you can see how smart and curious Tara was and is as a person. This book held the qualities of being heart-breaking and uplifting, but mostly exceedingly frustrating. This frustration was not from the writing but from how people can react to someone admitting that they were/are a victim of abuse. This was a remarkable story to read and Tara is an incredibly courageous and resilient person.

Review: Educated

“My life was narrated for me by others. Their voices were forceful, emphatic, absolute. It had never occurred to me that my voice might be as strong as theirs.” Tara Westover

Educated by Tara Westover 493 pages Genre: Memoir, non-fiction Published by Random House, 2018 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars Reviewed by Indiana Re-readability: I might come back to this one someday. Spoiler-free review

I usually enjoy memoirs and biographies. I like learning about other lives and paths.

While I highly recommend this book (I rated it 5 out of 5 stars) saying I enjoyed it would be false; I couldn’t help reading it. This book haunted my dreams and sometimes my waking moments.

Tara Westover, if you don’t already know, had a highly unusual upbringing. Born in Idaho to a family of survivalist Mormons, Westover and her siblings didn’t go to public school. They were sometimes homeschooled by their mother, but that often fell by the wayside when their father had work for them to do in the junkyard that he ran.

Her father plays an essential role in the family and in Westover’s life; he’s the one calling most of the shots in the family. But he clearly struggles with mental illness, as do one or more of his sons. He’s abusive and unconcerned with the welfare of his children to the point where he asks them to do incredibly dangerous work even from a young age. He also doesn’t trust the medical establishment; he believes that they’re somehow tied to the government, another entity he doesn’t trust. Thus, whenever he or his children seriously injured themselves, he wouldn’t allow them to go to the hospital. He claimed instead that God would work through either his wife or some other method to heal them.

That alone is terrifying. But that was only the start of why this book was so haunting.

Westover’s brother, who she was once very close with, became more and more physically and verbally abusive as Westover entered her teenage years and it didn’t end with adulthood, even after she was able to leave Idaho and go on to some of the most elite universities in the Western world. Who knows, it could be continuing today.

Of everything in the book, that haunted me the most. Here’s this woman who has somehow managed to not only “catch-up” from years of not being in school, but go well beyond the education level of the general population. Yet, she hasn’t really left Idaho in some ways. Her past, which was incredibly tough, but had loving and beautiful moments, is still there with her.

At the end, there’s a few scenes where she returns home again and as a reader, I just wanted to scream and shake her shoulders; to tell her to snap out of it and just stay away from these people. But you realize that at the end of the day, they’re her family and that’s a bond no level of education or distance of time or miles can really brake. Educated has been compared to Hillbilly Elegy by J. D. Vance, and while both authors grew up poor and went on to become highly educated, I’m not sure it’s an apt comparison at all. Vance was trying to explain something about the way he grew up, about his family and the culture he comes from. But Westover wasn’t trying to explain anything about her culture or her family, she wasn’t really even trying to prove that “any one can make it.” Westover was simply telling her story; the heartbreaking, encouraging and often disturbing story it is.

6 thoughts on “ Review: Educated ”

This is a greeat post

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Sounds like a great read!

Like Liked by 1 person

I’ve heard a lot about this one! I’m feeling drawn to read it too… although I know it won’t be an enjoyable read, as such. Good review!

Thank you! It’s excellent. I would definitely recommend it!

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The Literary Edit

Review: Educated by Tara Westover

Prior to the start of the new year, I wanted to set myself a reading goal for 2019. Ever since I finished my challenge to finish the BBC Big Read , I’ve missed having a literary list to work my way through. I initially toyed with the idea of trying to read 120 books in a year, before coming to the conclusion that 10 books a month might not be the most realistic of reading challenges, and so, I find myself, three days into the new year and yet to settle on both a worthy, but achievable bookish goal for 2019.

One thing I knew, however, was that I wanted to start reading in earnest as soon as the year began, so as soon as my hangover had subsided, I started Educated by Tara Westover.

Whether or not you have a keen or avid interest in books, it would have been almost impossible to have avoided the hype around Westover’s captivating memoir; an international bestseller, it’s been lauded by the likes of both Barack Obama and Bill Gates, and it too has been featured on the pages of Vanity Fair and Vogue. It was after listening to an interview with Westover on Elizabeth Day’s popular podcast How To Fail that I finally decided to read it.

A balanced and – by all accounts – brave, memoir of a dysfunctional family life in Idaho, Educated tells the story of Westover’s upbringing by fanatical Mormon parents, who thought the end of the word was nigh, and rejected mainstream education for the loosest sort of home-schooling; and traditional medicine for herbs. While her family was dominated by a father whose world view is derived from an extreme version of the Mormon faith, it too was affected by the violence and views of older brother Shawn, who frequently committed vulgar acts of strength and savagery over each and every one of his siblings.

Despite a childhood that was littered with many a brutal accident among the family members who worked on her father’s farm, Westover immersed herself into college life and contrived to turn her life around before ending up as a scholar in both Cambridge and Oxford.

Such a feat, however, was not without its struggles, and there were many and varied obstacles that Westover fought to overcome; from socialising with peers who drunk coke and shopped on the Sabbath (both of which she’d been brought up to believe were unholy sins) to a final and heartbreaking decision of whether to choose her newfound education or her family.

A compelling and captivating book that will open its reader’s eyes to a world beyond the bounds of anything they’ve read before. Educated is a story of conflicting beliefs, the capacity of memory, familial betrayal and, ultimately, the power of education.

About Educated

An unforgettable memoir in the tradition of The Glass Castle about a young girl who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University

Educated is an account of the struggle for self-invention. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty and of the grief that comes with severing the closest of ties. 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.

About Tara Westover

Tara Westover is an American author living in the UK. Born in Idaho to a father opposed to public education, she never attended school. She spent her days working in her father’s junkyard or stewing herbs for her mother, a self-taught herbalist and midwife. She was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom, and after that first taste, she pursued learning for the next decade. She received a BA from Brigham Young University in 2008 and was subsequently awarded a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. She earned an MPhil from Trinity College, Cambridge in 2009, and in 2010 was a visiting fellow at Harvard University. She returned to Cambridge, where she was awarded a PhD in history in 2014.

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Review of “Educated”

Educated is the emotional and thought-provoking memoir of a young woman who grew up in a dysfunctional family. Tara Westover’s family was physically abusive, emotionally abusive, and verbally abusive. This makes her memoir a poignant and inspiring story about a girl who fought her way out of the backwoods to Harvard.

In many ways, Tara’s story parallels J. D. Vance’s story in Hillbilly Elegy , a similar modern rags to educational riches story. But in a fundamental way, Tara’s story differs from Vance’s. These two young authors’ interpretations and take-aways of the dysfunction they grew up with differs dramatically. Tara fixates on homeschooling as a fundamental problem in her childhood, whereas Vance admits his problem was an unstable family life.

You see it in the title. Tara sees her fundamental triumph as overcoming her educationally neglectful background. Educated is peppered with comments along the lines of “I never knew about the Holocaust- because I was homeschooled.” With typical liberal distaste, she dismisses homeschooling as a poor education.

The notion that homeschooling is an inferior education has been so thoroughly debunked Tara’s blanket dismissal is almost laughable. Really, the only question up for debate is whether homeschooling provides an equal or better education to public school. The only way I can explain her disdain for a well-respected method of education is to believe she is projecting her own experience onto the many, many thousands of homeschooling families in America.

Homeschooled or not Schooled

From Tara’s account, her family did not engage in much formal education. You might better say she was not schooled than home schooled. Yet she self-admittedly had high reading comprehension skills and enough education to prepare for and pass the ACT’s with minimal help from an older sibling.

Would it have been better for her parents to provide her with a more structured and aided educational experience? Definitely. But is a public school style, teacher-directed education actually necessary for educational success? Tara herself, about half of her other siblings, and many other famous homeschoolers such as Abraham Lincoln show that learning, and the thirst for more learning, can be awakened in a variety of ways.

In fact, I’d go so far as to say Tara’s non-traditional education was a large part of the reason she did succeed academically. Assuming she had been in a typical public school, most likely she wouldn’t have had such an impressive higher education trajectory. Would a typical public school education have given her such an uncommon interior drive and thirst for education? Maybe, but maybe not. And what caught her instructors’ interest? That she was different because she had been homeschooled. Would they have pulled strings, finding her scholarships and study abroad opportunities, if she had been exactly like everyone else? Probably not.

Hillbilly Elegy Life Lessons

J. D. Vance’s memoir is a fascinating counterpoint to Tara’s. Vance came from a comparable abusive background, but spent his years in public school. Does he credit public school with any of his success? Nope. In fact, he repeatedly emphasizes that he struggled academically despite having every possible opportunity for success at school. What does Vance say made the difference and turned around his downward academic trajectory? It was when he finally moved in permanently with his grandmother in high school and entered a stable living situation for the first time in his life. For Vance, having stable relationships and peace at home were key to academic success.

You can see how Vance’s thoughts apply to Tara’s situation. He might say that her fundamental problem was not that she grew up homeschooled, but that she lived with an abusive, mentally unstable family. Vance would say that like himself, Tara wouldn’t have thrived academically in the public school system either. Her academic success began when she began to put physical and emotional distance between herself and her family.

Still Processing

Is Tara’s story inspiring? Absolutely. But is her portrayal of homeschooling problematic for the average American reader? Yes. I would almost call this book anti-homeschool propaganda, except for the raw pain that bleeds out of Tara’s words, showing her very real wounds. This poor young woman is still reeling from a terrible childhood. Fixating on homeschooling as the problem and education as the solution may help her not focus on the real problem in her life: an abusive family that she struggles to come to terms with. It’s just a shame that she is choosing to vilify homeschooling. I hope that such an intelligent person as Tara will eventually process and accept that her own experience of homeschooling (or not schooling at all) is far from a typical American homeschooling experience.

Should you read Educated ?

Be warned: Educated has quite a bit of domestic abuse and violence. Tara’s abuse from her older brother is particularly painful to read. If you can get past the violence and anti-homeschooling theme, then it is a well-written memoir about a young girl’s self transformation and will to survive. Alternatively, check out Hillbilly Elegy for a thought-provoking story sans the anti-homeschooling themes. (Note that Hillbilly Elegy is heavy on language.) Both these memoirs are absorbing and popular recent books: great for book club discussion or personal reading and reflection.

Or, buy these books through my affiliate page on Bookshop.org .

Disclaimer: Affiliate links mean that I receive a small fee for book sales when you buy through my links, at no additional cost to you.

One thought on “ Review of “Educated” ”

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Educated - Tara Westover

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ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0399590501
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Random House; First Edition (February 20, 2018)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 352 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0099511029
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0399590504

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9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, accomplices make plea deals with U.S.

WASHINGTON – An al Qaeda operative jailed at Guantanamo prison for nearly two decades and considered to be the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks has pleaded guilty along with two of his lieutenants in the terror organization, the U.S. Department of Defense said in a letter to victims' families Wednesday.

The letter, obtained by USA TODAY, said Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and two of his top lieutenants agreed to plead guilty "in exchange for the removal of the death penalty as a possible punishment."

"These three accused have agreed to plead guilty to all of the charged offenses, including the murder of the 2,976 people listed in the charge sheet, and to be later sentenced by a panel of military officers," according to the letter from the Department of Defense's Office of the Chief Prosecutor for Military Commissions.

Mohammed, or KSM as he is called by U.S. intelligence agents, is described as the “ principal architect of the 9/11 attacks ” in the 2004 report by the 9/11 Commission. Two of his accomplices in the planning for the 9/11 attack, Walid Bin Attash and Mustafa al-Hawasawi, also entered into plea agreements Wednesday, the DOD said in a statement .

All three men have been in U.S. custody since 2003 , spending time at Guantanamo and prisons overseas.

Mohammed is described in court papers as an al-Qaeda militant and the principal architect of the 9/11 assault on New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon outside Washington. Nearly 3,000 people died in the attacks, which launched a U.S. offensive labeled the War on Terror.

Federal authorities captured him in his native Pakistan native in 2003 and he was imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay in 2006.

Defense officials told families in the Wednesday letter that they will have an opportunity to speak at a summer 2025 sentencing hearing about the impact that the 9/11 attacks had on their loved ones.

"We recognize that the status of the case in general, and this news in particular, will understandably and appropriately elicit intense emotion, and we also realize that the decision to enter into a pre-trial agreement will be met with mixed reactions amongst the thousands of family members who lost loved ones," the letter said. "The decision to enter into a pre-trial agreement after 12 years of pre-trial litigation was not reached lightly; however, it is our collective, reasoned, and good-faith judgment that this resolution is the best path to finality and justice in this case."

9/11 families previously said they didn't want plea deals

The Department of Defense first disclosed last year that prosecutors were working on a plea deal that would spare Mohammed and his accomplices their lives.

Many 9/11 families slammed the potential agreement at that time, telling USA TODAY it amounted to a slap in the face to families seeking answers and accountability.

"The fact that there are now potential plea deals being offered right at the anniversary, it’s just a horrible, terrible feeling of betrayal,” Terry Strada told USA TODAY in the story. Strada's husband Tom died on the 104th floor of the World Trade Center’s North Tower. “I mean, justice has not been served in two decades. How much more do they expect the families to be able to take? People are dying without seeing justice done.”

President Joe Biden also issued a statement when the plea deals were first proposed, saying he concurred with the Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin’s recommendation not to accept deals suggested by the 9/11 defendants and their lawyers.

“The Administration,” the White House said in a 2023 statement to USA TODAY, “is committed to ensuring that the military commissions process is fair and delivers justice to the victims, survivors, families, and those accused of crimes.”

Investigators who worked on the case argued a plea agreement would deprive the public of the kind of official record produced in open court.

"The American people deserve to hear what the evidence is and not be satisfied with the fact that their government is telling them, well, we have these people, and they are guilty,” former FBI Agent Frank Pellegrino told USA TODAY at the time.

Highly educated, tortured in CIA custody

In CIA custody, interrogators subjected Mohammed to “enhanced interrogation techniques” including waterboarding him 183 times, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee's 2014 report on the agency’s detention and interrogation programs .

The 9/11 Commission report describes Mohammed as “highly educated” and the “model of the terrorist entrepreneur.”

KSM orchestrated various terrorist plots, according to the report, including “car bombing, political assassination, aircraft bombing, hijacking, reservoir poisoning, and, ultimately, the use of aircraft as missiles guided by suicide operatives.”

He grew up in Kuwait but traces his ethnic roots to the Baluchistan region between Pakistan and Iran, the report says. He was raised in a religious family, joined the Muslim Brotherhood at 16 and became “enamored of violent jihad at youth camps in the desert.”

In 1983, he moved from Kuwait to the U.S. to attend Chowan College, a small Baptist school in North Carolina. He transferred a semester later to North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University in Greensboro and earned a degree in December 1986, the report says.

KSM took up the anti-Soviet Afghan cause soon after graduating, according to the 9/11 Commission. He traveled to Peshawar, Pakistan, where he fell in with notable Afghan mujahideen, or holy warriors, who became his mentors.

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Italian Boxer Quits Bout, Sparking Furor Over Gender at Olympics

The Italian, Angela Carini, stopped fighting only 46 seconds into her matchup against Imane Khelif of Algeria, who had been barred from a women’s event last year.

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By Tariq Panja and Jeré Longman

Reporting from Paris

An Italian boxer abandoned her bout at the Paris Olympics after only 46 seconds on Thursday, refusing to continue after taking a heavy punch from an Algerian opponent who had been disqualified from last year’s world championships over questions about her eligibility to compete in women’s sports.

The Italian boxer, Angela Carini, withdrew after her Algerian opponent, Imane Khelif, landed a powerful blow that struck Carini square in the face. Carini paused for a moment, then turned her back to Khelif and walked to her corner. Her coaches quickly signaled that she would not continue, and the referee stopped the fight.

Khelif, 25, was permitted to compete at the Olympics even though she had been barred last year after boxing officials said she did not meet eligibility requirements to compete in a women’s event. Another athlete also barred from last year’s world championships under similar circumstances, Lin Yu-ting, has also been cleared to fight in Paris.

The International Boxing Association, which ran those championships and ordered the disqualifications, offered little insight into the reasons for the boxers’ removal, saying in a statement that the disqualifications came after “the athletes did not undergo a testosterone examination but were subject to a separate and recognized test .”

The association said that test, the specifics of which it said were confidential, “conclusively indicated that both athletes did not meet the required necessary eligibility criteria and were found to have competitive advantages over other female competitors.”

Those rules, which the boxing association adopted for the 2016 Rio Games, are the same ones the International Olympic Committee is operating under as the authority running the boxing tournament at the Paris Games. But the rules, the I.O.C. confirmed, do not include language about testosterone or restrictions on gender eligibility beyond a single line saying “gender tests may be conducted.”

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COMMENTS

Educated by Tara Westover (a review) : r/books
Educated by Tara Westover (a review) I just finished reading this book, god it's an absolute gem. It's honest and well written. Westover was born in a very conservative and partriachal household. Her family was toxic, father narcissistic and elder brother sadistic. She and her siblings were never enrolled in a school, as her father believed ...
Can we please talk about Educated by Tara Westover? : r/books
The Goodreads description: "Tara Westover was 17 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".
Book review Educated Tara Westover
1:07. Tara Westover is living proof that some people are flat-out, boots-always-laced-up indomitable. Her new book, Educated (Random House, 334 pp., ★★★★ out of four), is a heartbreaking ...
Book review of "Educated" by Tara Westover
Educated was named one of the Ten Best Books of the Year by the New York Times Book Review and one of the best books of the year by many other publications. It is definitely that. For related reading. You'll find this book on The 40 best books of the decade from 2010-19. You may also care to take a look at my post, 14 excellent memoirs.
Review: 'Educated,' by Tara Westover
EDUCATED. A Memoir. By Tara Westover. 335 pp. Random House. $28. America has struggled with the urban-rural divide for centuries, stretching all the way back to when Manhattan's own Alexander ...
Review: Tara Westover's 'Educated: A Memoir'
Tara Westover's one-of-a-kind memoir is about the shaping of a mind, yet page after page describes the maiming of bodies—not just hers, but the heads, limbs, and torsos of her parents and six ...
"Educated," by Tara Westover
What we're watching, listening to, and doing this week, online, in N.Y.C., and beyond. Paid subscribers also receive book picks. Alexandra Schwartz reviews "Educated," a memoir by Tara ...
Educated by Tara Westover: Summary and reviews
Book Summary. Winner of the 2018 BookBrowse Nonfiction Award. 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 ...
Family's Response: Educated by Tara Westover
Tara Westover's Family and Responses to Educated (Update 8/2020: LaRee Westover — "Faye" in the book, the mother of Tara Westover, has written a book called "Educating" that's partially a response to Educated.She's crowdfunding it on Indiegogo.. I went through a lot of the comments that her family has made publicly (on Facebook, Amazon, and Goodreads, etc.) about the book, and ...
EDUCATED
A wonderful page-turner written with humility, immediacy, and great style. Nothing came cheap and easy to McCandless, nor will it to readers of Krakauer's narrative. (4 maps) (First printing of 35,000; author tour) Share your opinion of this book. A recent Cambridge University doctorate debuts with a wrenching account of her childhood and youth ...
Educated by Tara Westover
Educated is an account of the struggle for self-invention of Tara Westover. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty and of the grief that comes with severing the closest of ties. 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 ...
Educated by Tara Westover
Educated by Tara Westover. From the outset you can see how smart and curious Tara was and is as a person. This book held the qualities of being heart-breaking and uplifting, but mostly exceedingly frustrating. This frustration was not from the writing but from how people can react to someone admitting that they were/are a victim of abuse.
Educated by Tara Westover : r/books
Educated is the story of Mrs. Westover growing up in rural Idaho with a heavy handed conspiracy theorist, survivalist father who's harsh, often times paranoid, lording over of the family came very close to creating a very differant life for Tara. Fascinating book, especially when Tara realizes that she is actually incredibly intelligent and ...
Review: Educated
While I highly recommend this book (I rated it 5 out of 5 stars) saying I enjoyed it would be false; I couldn't help reading it. This book haunted my dreams and sometimes my waking moments. Tara Westover, if you don't already know, had a highly unusual upbringing.
Educated Book Review : r/ReviewGuide
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Review: Educated by Tara Westover
Educated is a raw, emotional, and at times, heartbreaking account of Tara Westover's life. Tara endured both physical and verbal abuse at the hands of family members and saw her education, as well as her overall wellbeing, neglected by her parents. Throughout the book, she strives to deliver an unbiased account of events, going so far as to ...
Review: Educated by Tara Westover
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 with severing the closest of ties. With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, Westover has crafted a universal ...
Review of "Educated"
Review of "Educated". Educated is the emotional and thought-provoking memoir of a young woman who grew up in a dysfunctional family. Tara Westover's family was physically abusive, emotionally abusive, and verbally abusive. This makes her memoir a poignant and inspiring story about a girl who fought her way out of the backwoods to Harvard.
Educated
Share to Reddit. Share to Tumblr. Share to Pinterest. ... NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW • ONE OF PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR • BILL GATES'S HOLIDAY READING LIST • FINALIST: ... westover-tara-educated-2018-random-house-publishing-group Identifier-ark ark:/13960 ...
Review: 'Harold and the Purple Crayon' draws a perplexing adaptation
The book by Crockett Johnson, published in 1955, is aimed at ages 3 and up, but the film, starring an almost entirely adult cast, skews older. But the premise still feels too thin and juvenile to ...
Biden administration rule protecting LGBT students blocked in 26 states
A new federal rule protecting LGBT students from discrimination in schools and colleges based on gender identity that took effect on Thursday remained blocked in 26 states after the U.S. Supreme ...
Educated Book Review : r/DiscountAdvice
Click for Educated Book Review. You may read analyzed specs and features with Educated Book Review. There are honest consumer reports according to long term usage experiences. This is really helpful to learn all features, specs and consumer guides.
9/11 mastermind, accomplices make plea deal with U.S. after 20+ years
The 9/11 Commission report describes Mohammed as "highly educated" and the "model of the terrorist entrepreneur.". KSM orchestrated various terrorist plots, according to the report ...
Italian Boxer Quits Bout, Sparking Furor Over Gender at Olympics
The Italian, Angela Carini, stopped fighting only 46 seconds into her matchup against Imane Khelif of Algeria, who had been barred from a women's event last year.

“Educated” by Tara Westover: A remarkably candid memoir about growing up survivalist

A remarkably candid memoir about growing up among survivalists

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover (2018) 336 pages ★★★★★

A long, slow learning curve

A powerful attraction to the land

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Educated Is a Brutal, One-of-a-Kind Memoir

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“Educated,” by Tara Westover

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THE 48 LAWS OF POWER

INTO THE WILD

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Educated by Tara Westover

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