Finding My Way
by Malala YousafzaiSetting: England
Genres: Biography & Autobiography / Memoirs
Length: 8:57
Narrator: Malala Yousefzai
Published on October 21, 2025
Pages: 320
Format: Audiobook Source: Library
This is not the story you think you know. It’s the one I’ve been waiting to tell.
Thrust onto the public stage at fifteen years old after the Taliban’s brutal attack on her life, Malala Yousafzai quickly became an international icon known for bravery and resilience. But away from the cameras and crowds, she spent years struggling to find her place in an unfamiliar world. Now, for the first time ever, Malala takes us beyond the headlines in Finding My Way—a vulnerable, surprising memoir that buzzes with authenticity, sharp humor, and tenderness.
Finding My Way is a story of friendship and first love, of anxiety and self-discovery, of trying to stay true to yourself when everyone wants to tell you who you are. In it, Malala traces her path from high school loner to reckless college student to a young woman at peace with her past. Through candid, often messy moments like nearly failing exams, getting ghosted, and meeting the love of her life, Malala reminds us that real role models aren’t perfect—they’re human.
In this astonishing memoir, Malala reintroduces herself to the world, sharing how she navigated life as someone whose darkest moments threatened to define her narrative—while seeking the freedom to find out who she truly is. Finding My Way is an intimate look at the life of a young woman taking charge of her destiny—and a deeply personal testament to the strength it takes to be unapologetically yourself.
This book was incredible.
This is the story of what happens after. After you get famous for something horrible happening to you. After a Nobel Prize. How do you try to just be a college student?
Oxford
I didn’t know how Oxford worked. Basically, you get a set of assignments and readings to do each week. You have to go to a small group to discuss them once a week. You are on our own otherwise to get your work done. There is a test at the end of three years to see if you get a degree or not.
I’m the kind of person who would have thrived in that in environment. Malala was not. She is a social butterfly. She had never been on her own or allowed to make any of her own decisions. Studying was way down on her list of priorities. You also aren’t allowed to have a job while at Oxford (for at least the first year). That’s problematic for low income students in general. Malala had a worldwide organization and was the sole source of income for her family. She felt pressured to keep traveling to speak in many countries when she was supposed to be writing papers and meeting her group sessions at Oxford. She kept falling further behind which added to the pressure of being an education activist who was in danger of failing college.
Mental Health
Malala had always said that she didn’t remember the attack on her. She vaguely remembered being on the bus and then she woke up in England after being airlifted for surgery. After a bad drug trip at Oxford, her mind served up all her repressed memories at once. She had panic attacks and flashbacks. It took her a long time to accept that she needed any mental health services because that wasn’t a part of her culture. It severely affected her life before she started to open to the fact that she had PTSD and that she needed help.
Activism
She doesn’t write a lot about her foundation’s activities in this book. It is mostly about her life in college and immediately afterwards. She does talk about starting a school for girls in her grandmother’s remote area of Pakistan. The other time she talks passionately about events is about the takeover of Afghanistan by the Taliban after the U.S. left. That’s when the voice of the young adult left and the experienced activist shone through.
She talks about needing to evacuate the female teachers from their schools in Afghanistan. She reached out to world leaders and realized that many wouldn’t take her phone calls when she wanted something and wasn’t just a cute photo op for them. She said that the people who did help her were women. Female world leaders answered the phone and took tangible action to get people on planes and entry into safer countries.
She talks about her story being a time when the world came together over one girl being shot for wanting to go to school but now a whole country was being turned over to men who were going to kill women for the same thing and no one cared. It is a powerful section.
I would have liked to hear more about the practicalities of her life. How was the foundation functioning when she had to step back in college? What is the organizational structure like? She has constant bodyguards. How does that work?
I’d recommend this book on audio. She reads it herself.
