Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover was a surprising read that deserves its recognition. Tara was born in Idaho to a Mormon fundamentalist family living in the Mountains. She has gained a Ph.D. from Cambridge in history. Westover is only 33 years old and works in the education field with Educated being her first book. The memoir was a wonderful novel, that was creatively written as a thriller of a gut-wrenching lifestyle that doesn’t try to lie about facts that the author understands may not be truthful. Tara adds in footnotes pointing out how various memories differed from her brothers or parents, but no one seemed to have the exact memory. So, she just goes with her memory, to add to the flow to the story. Yet she makes sure to let the reader know that this memory may or may not happen how she remembered it. According to Tara, she suffered abuse from her brother Shawn and her parents allowed for this abuse to continue. Shawn did not seem to do the abuse in front of their father but did so in front of the mother. The mother refused to tell her own husband about the abuse her daughters faced every day. Adding to the trauma of working at a steel mill and being made to work at dangerous mills, it is no wonder Tara saw things differently.
Her mother was a part of the essential oil movement before essential oils were popular, and now the family makes millions off of their company. According to Tara, her parents truly believe in the miracles of herbology and oils. These remedies will work, of course, if the person using them has enough faith in the Lord. So, it wasn’t just good enough to take the oils, you had to be religious (the right kind of religious). Faye, the mother, started to come into her own by being forced to become a midwife and then practicing with medical herbs. Tara blames a car crash, in which she believes left her mother became slightly brain-damaged, to her mother’s sudden fascination with New Age medical practices.
We learn later in the story that Tara was taught very basic American history from her father, and her two older brothers received formal education. The other children were left to learn on their own. Which surprisingly most of her siblings went on to be college graduates and at least three received Ph.Ds. While Tara remembers her father hating education from the Government, it did seem in the story that her father wasn’t as strict about his kids going to university. Especially when his family started to profit off of the essential oil business her mother was creating. The father was projected as a highly intelligent man but one who Tara believes must have some kind of mental disorder. The father in the tale, isn’t projected as a crazy loon, but a man who his disillusioned with the government and family. He is a man who read the bible multiple times but took a verse on the good should eat honey and dairy, as the whole family couldn’t eat dairy.
The main evil character in the book was her brother Shawn. Someone who her father believed above his other children. A man who was abusive to his wife and girlfriends in front of everyone, openly beat Tara at a thanksgiving dinner, used racial slurs, and was just downright nasty. We also get an odd sense that Shawn was wanting to be more than just abusive to his sister, almost bordering on molestation. Why Tara chooses to say her dad had a mental disorder and not her brother, was kind of interesting in the story. It’s obvious her brother was abusive, his mental moods changed continently, and everyone was happy to ignore them. Ignoring his behavior led to Tara to leave her family for good, as he turned everyone away from her.
As someone from a small town, I understand the mentality of the people in her life. The author is a woman who slowly started to be educated about the world and was introduced to different kinds of Mormons and even to Muslims in the Middle East. Her mind exploded with books and learning. Coming back home was slowly destroying her and she mentions how the mill was like a step backward. There was no way her mother or father could understand what she was learning. It doesn’t seem her family seemed to mind not understanding, mine doesn’t mind either, but when she started to challenge the family hierarchy that’s when things started to go south for her.
This book is a must-read for those wanting a really interesting memoir of someone’s life. It is not really centered on education perse, as family is the main theme of the book rather than how education changed her life. Education is the obvious game-changer in her life, more particularly College was, the book isn’t really on how education completely changed her entire life. It is wonderful to see her change her attitude about other Mormons and educate herself on minorities. There is a sense in the book that she may not be fundamentalist Mormon anymore, but it would have been nice for her to mention how she feels about it after she got her Ph.D. Personally, I didn’t care about the family drama and would have enjoyed more talk about her life in Harvard and at University. For those who grew up in a small town, many of the dramas and craziness hits right at home, and for those who have lived through abuse or changed themselves by leaving home, this is a memoir for you.