Educated

/ posted in: Book Review, Reading

Educated by Tara Westover
on February 20, 2018
Pages: 334
Length: 12:10
Genres: Nonfiction, Personal Memoirs
Published by Random House
Format: Audiobook
Source: Audible, Owned
Setting: Idaho

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

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. 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.

Somehow I completely missed the point of this book from the previews I read. I thought this was going to be a book about a woman who received a college education after a lifetime of fake homeschool. What this book is actually about is how a lifetime of psychological and physical abuse leaves scars that no amount of education can heal.

This book is brutal. Tara is the youngest child of a Morman family whose father believes that they need to prepare constantly for the end times. The children are kept out of school to keep them out of the hands of the Illuminati. Half-hearted attempts were occasionally made to teach the children but by the time Tara came along, they weren’t even trying anymore. She was indoctrinated in her father’s way of thinking which included regressive attitudes about women.

Her relationship with an older brother, Shawn, was the worst of her problems. At times he protected her from her father’s plans for her. Other times he beat her. In between he manipulated her into believing everything was her fault because she was a weak woman who needed to be disciplined to keep from becoming a whore. The violence and psychological torture escalated as she got older. Any attempt to stand up for herself was brutally squashed.

Another brother convinced her that she could go to college and get out. She did but hid everything from the outside world. She had no idea how to function in society. Her training in conspiracy theories led her to reject help from the state or the church because she believed any assistance was the way they got you to start participating in their evil.

I was looking forward to reading about how she got out into the wider world. This is actually where the story gets worse. Her family’s attempts to reel her back in are monstrous. Her mind was so broken by their brainwashing that she couldn’t see who to trust. All she knew was that it was her duty to do what her family said.

As of the writing of the memoir, she is out and she is alive. It could have gone the other way many times.

While this book is extreme, I didn’t see it as far-fetched. I’ve read several reviews that consider the story suspect. While I don’t know anyone who has gone through this, I can see parts of people I know in many aspects of this story. I see the affects of growing up with mentally ill, abusive parents who I would have written off years ago, in loved ones who are still trying to connect with these parents. I’ve seen people struggle to rid themselves of the ideas that they were exposed to in childhood. They know they aren’t true but still there is that small voice that asks, “But what if is it is true?”

This isn’t a happy memoir of the power of education and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. I think this is an important book but be prepared to be very disturbed by the level of abuse described and then almost immediately discounted as unimportant or worse, deserved.

“Everything I had worked for, all my years of study, had been to purchase for myself this one privilege: to see and experience more truths than those given to me by my father, and to use those truths to construct my own mind. I had come to believe that the ability to evaluate many ideas, many histories, many points of view, was at the heart of what it means to self-create. If I yielded now, I would lose more than an argument. I would lose custody of my own mind. This was the price I was being asked to pay, I understood that now. What my father wanted to cast from me wasn’t a demon: it was me.”

Becoming Nicole

/ posted in: Reading Becoming Nicole

Becoming Nicole: The Transformation of an American Family by Amy Ellis Nutt
on October 20th 2015
Pages: 279
Published by Random House
Format: Audiobook
Source: Library
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)
Setting: Maine

“The inspiring true story of a transgender girl, her identical twin brother, and an ordinary American family’s extraordinary journey to understand, nurture, and celebrate the uniqueness in us all, from the Pulitzer Prize–winning science reporter for The Washington Post.”

Wayne and Kelly Maines adopted identical twin boys at birth. They were named Jonas and Wyatt. Starting around age 2, Wyatt started showing a strong preference for stereotypically female toys, clothes, and activities. He started asking about why people thought he was a boy.

I did enjoy the discussion of prenatal development that attempt to explain how identical twins can turn out so differently. Different positioning in utero can influence the availability of hormones to each twin, for example.

Mrs. Maines accepted what Wyatt was trying to tell her at an early age but Mr. Maines did not.

This section of the book was frustrating for me to listen to because there seemed to be so much misogyny involved. It seemed like the reason that Mr. Maines fought this for so long and so hard is that he had a hard time with a son of his preferring female things over male things. The book talks about how he wanted to play sports and hunt with his sons. Well, a girl child could do those things also. That was never mentioned. It was either there was going to be a rough-and-tumble boy or a sweet little princess girl. For a book about trans issues, the discussion of gender roles seemed very inflexible.

Wyatt’s classmates didn’t have a problem with any of this through elementary school. When it came time for middle school, the decision was made after talking to teachers, doctors, and counselors to have a legal name change to Nicole and to let her wear feminine clothing to school. This more public acknowledgement of Nicole’s transgender identity started to become controversial.

A Maine anti-LGBT group got involved in protesting against her. A grandfather of another student in the school told his grandson that if he ever saw Nicole go into the girls’ bathroom, he was to follow her in there because he had every right to be in there too.

It always comes down to the bathrooms. Why is that?

It makes me wonder if I’ve been using public restrooms wrong this whole time. Are we supposed to be getting naked and cavorting around the stalls? What do people imagine is going on?

Amazingly, the “logic” always seems to go like this:

Letting transgender people use the bathroom they identify with is the same as letting any random person choose any bathroom they feel like going into on any given day.
So, cis heterosexual men will take advantage of this opportunity to go into women’s restroom where (we must presume) they are imagining naked women lining up for their perusal.
This will lead to rape.

So, if I’m following the logic correctly, all we can fix all this and still let transgender people go to the bathroom in peace. All we need to do is:

Make cis heterosexual psychosexually disturbed men use a private restroom of their own — and —-
Teach these same men not to rape people

Problem solved! Notice that nowhere in here are transgender people a public hazard AT ALL.

Anyway, instead of using my logic, the school district banned Nicole from the girl’s restroom and made her be monitored by an adult at all times. This was supposed to be for her safety to keep the other student who was harassing her away but it punished her instead of dealing with his harassment. After trying to work out a solution, the Maines moved and filed suit against the district.

The lawsuit worked its way up to the Maine Supreme Court where they finally won a ruling that kids in school in Maine are allowed to use a restroom that conforms to their gender identity.

I finished this audiobook a few days before HBO released The Trans List, which includes an interview with Nicole. In this trailer, she is youngest woman who is talking about bathrooms. I watched the documentary. It is very good. It is only an hour long so if you have access to it you should definitely watch.

The Whole Town’s Talking

/ posted in: Reading The Whole Town’s Talking

The Whole Town's Talking by Fannie Flagg
on November 29th 2016
Pages: 224
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Fiction
Published by Random House
Format: eARC
Source: From author/publisher
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)
Setting: Missouri

“Elmwood Springs, Missouri, is a small town like any other, but something strange is happening out at the cemetery. “Still Meadows,” as it’s called, is anything but still.”

I love Fannie Flagg’s books. You know what you are going to get with them. They will be funny and heartfelt stories of small towns.

This is the story of the founding of Elmwood Springs, Missouri. It is settled by Swedish farmers who decide that they need to carve out a town to support their farms. The first white settler in the area was named Lordor Nordstrom. Eventually the women of the surrounding farms decide that he needs a wife. He advertises for a bride and finds a nice Swedish woman in Chicago. Their romance is sweet and charming.

The town grows through the years and eventually the founding settlers begin to die. This is where the story takes a turn. In Elmwood Springs the residents of the cemetery are still involved in town life. They keep up on the local gossip from interviewing new arrivals and from listening to what visitors to the cemetery say.

I liked the beginning of the book but most of the cemetery section was less interesting for me. The action skipped over years at a time. It was hard to keep track of the family trees as time passed. The epilogue of the book redeemed it for me though. It ties together what appeared to be major plot holes in the story in a satisfying way.

This was a quick read. I read it in one setting. This is a great book for a cozy night of comfort reading when you don’t want anything too challenging.

Book received from NetGalley in exchange for a review

Paris in Love

/ posted in: Reading Paris in Love

Paris in Love by Eloisa James
on April 3rd 2012
Pages: 272
Genres: Nonfiction, Personal Memoirs
Published by Random House
Format: eBook
Source: Owned
Buy on Amazon (affiliate link)
Setting: France

“In 2009, New York Times bestselling author Eloisa James took a leap that many people dream about: she sold her house, took a sabbatical from her job as a Shakespeare professor, and moved her family to Paris. With no classes to teach, no committee meetings to attend, no lawn to mow or cars to park, Eloisa revels in the ordinary pleasures of life—discovering corner museums that tourists overlook, chronicling Frenchwomen’s sartorial triumphs, walking from one end of Paris to another. She copes with her Italian husband’s notions of quality time; her two hilarious children, ages eleven and fifteen, as they navigate schools—not to mention puberty—in a foreign language; and her mother-in-law Marina’s raised eyebrow in the kitchen (even as Marina overfeeds Milo, the family dog). “

I picked up this ebook on a day it was free and then it sat on my iPad until I read a post on Felicia’s blog with recommendations for romance books. Eloisa James was recommended. When I went looking for her books I realized that I already owned one.

This is her memoir about her family’s year in Paris. It was developed from her Facebook posts so it contains mainly short snippets of information about her days interspersed with longer essays.

She is an American who is married to an Italian man. They live in New Jersey and have 2 kids. They move to Paris and enroll the kids in an Italian language school because they are fluent. Her son is taking classes like architectural drawing that he isn’t interested in so he doesn’t do the work. Her daughter is now a child who is well acquainted with principals’ offices on two continents. Eloisa walks around the city sampling the food and getting mad that her husband is losing weight as fast as she is gaining it.

“I asked if Alessandro would pick up some of the spectacular chocolate mousse made by a patisserie on the nearby rue Richer. His response: “I thought you were on a diet.” These seven words rank among the more imprudent things he has said to me in the long years of our marriage.”

The Saga of Milo

Background – They had a Chihuahua named Milo. He used to fly back and forth from the U.S. to Italy with them when they visited her husband’s family. But Milo got fat. He got stranded in Italy because he was too heavy to fly back to the U.S. in the cabin. So Milo has been staying with Italian Grandma until he loses weight. Yeah, it’s not happening. Occasionally she reports in on Milo’s vet visits with Grandma.

“Apparently the vet has suggested vegetables, so for dinner Milo is having lightly steamed broccoli tossed in just a touch of butter, and some diet dog food steeped in homemade chicken broth.”

I have these clients.

“Milo has been back to the vet for a follow-up visit. To Marina’s dismay, her Florentine vet labeled Milo obese, even after she protested that ‘he never eats.’ Apparently the vet’s gaze rest thoughtfully on Milo’s seal-like physique, and then he said, ‘He may be telling you that, but we can all see he’s fibbing.'”

I have never been that brave.

“Marina said today the first thing she plans to do back in Florence is find a new vet. That nasty vet who told her Milo is obese, she said, is too young and doesn’t understand Milo’s emotional problems.”

I read a lot of the Milo sections to my coworkers. They thought they were hysterical. Yes, this is our life.