Educated

Educated is a religious memoir by Tara Westover. She is an American essayist, historian, and memoirist. Julia Whelan did the narration of this Educated audiobook. Her vocal performance was a perfect match for this book.

Tara Westover was born to survivalists in the mountainous area of Idaho. She was 17 years old when she entered any classroom for the very first time. Her family was severely isolated from mainstream society and there was absolutely nobody there to ensure that the children received any formal education. One of her brothers became extremely violent and there was nobody to intervene.

Her other brother got to college and that was when Tara decided to try a new life for herself as well. It was her great quest for knowledge that completely transformed her and took her from the mountains of Idaho to the prestigious Harvard and Cambridge University across the oceans and the continents. Her journey to such big places made her wonder whether will she be able to still find her way back home ever or not.

Educated is the debut memoir of Tara Westover and it became the number one bestseller in New York Times. The book was also among the finalists for several national awards. One notable opinion about this book is that it can be quite difficult at times.

There will be several unpleasant and strong emotions including fear, anger, and sadness. The book overall is quite propulsive and beautiful. Despite the singularity of this book with the childhood of Tara Westover, the different questions that it posed were all universal. How much do we give ourselves to all those whom we love and care about a lot? How much we should be willing to betray them for growing up?