“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.” After I'm Glad My Mom Died I was looking for another memoir and Educated seemed to be quite similar in terms of themes and vibes. Again, this is a story that shows how sometimes our parents, the people you would expect to only want the best for you, might achieve the total opposite. Tara Westover cuts ties with her fundamentalist, survalist family with the goal to get a university education. We learn about her upbringing through "home school" and her hunger for knowledge. This book definitely made me realise once again how privileged I am here in Europe with our mandatory school education. The book also highlights the emotional struggles that come before the decision of cutting ties with your family and letting go of abusive relationships. The story of Tara definitely touched me, even though I wasn't super impressed with her writing (she might be an amazing academic writer, but her prose lacked something). And I am also left wondering about how accurate this book is. There were some footnotes included, especially in her retellings of her childhood, where she pointed out that other family members had different memories about certain events. So there is definitely a seed of doubt in my mind. I feel like some explanations are missing, if by accident or on purpose, we will never know for sure.

Ich bin auf dieses Buch aufmerksam geworden, weil Bill Gates (ja, wirklich) es empfohlen hat. Er veröffentlicht jedes Jahr eine Liste mit 5 Büchern, die ihn besonders beeindruckt haben. Autobiographien sind sonst eher nicht meine bevorzugte Lektüre, aber die Beschreibung klang spannend. Und - oh, wie hab ich mir beim Lesen gewünscht, dass es ein Roman wäre! Die Geschichte von Tara Westover, die bei einer fundamentalistischen Mormomen-Familie in Idaho aufwächst und nie eine Schule besucht, ist an vielen Stellen so detailreich grausam, dass es beim Lesen schmerzt zu wissen, dass das alles real ist. Das eigentliche Thema des Buches ist aber ihre Befreiung - und das vor allem auf mentaler und emotionaler Ebene - von den Umständen ihrer Kindheit und Jugend und dem "Brainwash", den sie erfahren hat. Sie beschreibt diese Befreiung oder eben "Education", wie sie es nennt, in einer extrem guten und präzisen Sprache. Absolute 5-Stern und 120% Leseempfehlung für jeden. Keine einfache oder unterhaltsame Lektüre, aber eine sehr bereichernde und augenöffnende!

This book was very hard to read - or rather to stomach. Keep in mind trigger warnings before reading it. It would have impacted me even more if I had read it physically instead of the audiobook (even though it was very good, Julia Whelan might be my favorite narrator ever). It feels wrong to write a review about someones life story and you can't really speak about "loving" this book given the difficult things that are talked about. What I can say is that I liked the writing and I will think about it for a long time. It inspired me and in some way even educated me as I've never read about Mormonism and have never thought about family like Taras even existing (which is very narrow-minded and privileged of me). Given the various opinons in other reviews I wasn't sure if I really want to read this one for the last few months, but I'm glad I did. I already had to tell several other people and talk with them about it and that is not something I do very often. Trigger warnings: physical and emotional abuse, slightly graphic descriptions about severe injuries, mental illness

This book had me in its grip for the better part of two days. Westover puts her perspective of a survivalist upbringing in the mountains of Idaho in a powerful narrative on family, loyalty, estrangment and education. Moreover she does make a point in showing that to have your own point of view you need access to different ones.

Story: 5 Characters: 5 Pacing (Kept Attention): 5 Understandable Writing: 5 Narration: 5 Likability: 5 Overall: 5/5, 100%, A+ This is one of the best books I have ever had a chance to listen to. I am not a non-fiction type person. I rarely read non-fiction, as it bores me very easily. This novel though, it's practically written like it is a piece of fiction, with her writing style, and the actions that the characters make in the story all seem unreal, but you're forced to realize that this is an actual true story, and it blows my mind every time I remember this. Easily a one-of-a-kind book that you will not want to put down or stop listening to of the audiobook.

4.5* In Educated beschreibt Tara Westover ihre Kindheit in einer sehr religiösen fundamentalistischen Familie die nicht an Bildung glaubte und wie sie es dennoch schaffte zu studieren und ihren eigenen Weg zu gehen. Während Tara Westovers Geschichte wirklich inspirierend ist, ist sie doch teilweise hart zu lesen. Ihre Kindheit ist alles andere als einfach, anstatt zur Schule zu gehen helfen die Kinder zu Hause, denn der Vater traut dem öffentlichen Schulwesen nicht. Genauso wenig traut er Ärzten und so wird alles zu Hause behandelt, selbst teilweise schwere Verletzungen nach Unfällen. Das Buch ist wirklich toll geschrieben und ich fand es faszinierend zu lesen wie sich für Tara Westover durch ihren Entscheid zu studieren eine ganz neue Welt aufgetan hat. Dabei wird aber auch klar, dass dies nicht einfach war für sie, denn sie beschreibt auch gut wie viel ihr ihre Familie trotz allem bedeutet und wie schwierig es für sie war sich gegen sie zu stellen. Insgesamt eine wirklich inspirierende Geschichte, die zeigt welchen Effekt Bildung haben kann.

This book was very hard to read - or rather to stomach. Keep in mind trigger warnings before reading it. It would have impacted me even more if I had read it physically instead of the audiobook (even though it was very good, Julia Whelan might be my favorite narrator ever). It feels wrong to write a review about someones life story and you can't really speak about "loving" this book given the difficult things that are talked about. What I can say is that I liked the writing and I will think about it for a long time. It inspired me and in some way even educated me as I've never read about Mormonism and have never thought about family like Taras even existing (which is very narrow-minded and privileged of me). Given the various opinons in other reviews I wasn't sure if I really want to read this one for the last few months, but I'm glad I did. I already had to tell several other people and talk with them about it and that is not something I do very often. Trigger warnings: physical and emotional abuse, slightly graphic descriptions about severe injuries, mental illness

This book was very hard to read - or rather to stomach. Keep in mind trigger warnings before reading it. It would have impacted me even more if I had read it physically instead of the audiobook (even though it was very good, Julia Whelan might be my favorite narrator ever). It feels wrong to write a review about someones life story and you can't really speak about "loving" this book given the difficult things that are talked about. What I can say is that I liked the writing and I will think about it for a long time. It inspired me and in some way even educated me as I've never read about Mormonism and have never thought about family like Taras even existing (which is very narrow-minded and privileged of me). Given the various opinons in other reviews I wasn't sure if I really want to read this one for the last few months, but I'm glad I did. I already had to tell several other people and talk with them about it and that is not something I do very often. Trigger warnings: physical and emotional abuse, slightly graphic descriptions about severe injuries, mental illness