STAFF PICK: Educated by Tara Westover

Educated.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Title: Educated: A Memoir
Author: Tara Westover
Narrator: Julia Whelan

Anyone who knows me well knows that I love coming-of-age memoirs almost as much as air. Reminiscent of one of my all-time favorites, The Glass Castle, Educated is a perfect example of the power of curiosity, ambition, and education.

Kept out of school by her survivalist family, Tara Westover didn’t experience her first day of school until she was 17-years-old. Growing up in the Idaho mountains, she spent her childhood preparing for the end of the world by stockpiling home-canned goods, stewing herbs, salvaging metal, and sleeping with her “head-for-the-hills” bag. Four out of the seven Westover children don’t have birth certificates. None of them have medical or school records, as the children were all born at home and rely on natural medicine made by Tara’s mother, courtesy of her father’s distrust in modern medicine.

After one of her brothers goes to college and returns armed with stories of the outside world, Tara was inspired to teach herself enough math, grammar, and science to get herself into Brigham Young University, eventually earning a PhD from Cambridge University. It was here that she learned about major world events like the Holocaust and Civil Rights Movement, but not without shock, judgement, and curiosity from her peers.

Tara’s storytelling abilities, beautiful and vivid, are powerful enough to make me feel as though I’ve met the characters and been to the locations in a dream:

my father was not a tall man, but he was able to command a room. he had a presence about him, the solemnity of an oracle. his hands were thick and leathery — the hands of a man who’d been hard at work all his life — and they grasped the bible firmly.

Narrator Julia Whelan does an excellent job of embracing the author’s thirst for knowledge, zest for life, and struggle to adapt to a new life while realizing that maybe you can’t truly go home again.

Sample the audio and get the whole story.

March’s Top 10 Audiobooks.com Member Downloads

Listen to this month’s roundup of the top fiction and non fiction titles downloaded by Audiobooks.com members.

Fiction

1. The Flight Attendant by Chris Bohjalian, narrated by Mark DeakinsErin Spencer and Grace Experience

Flight Attendant.

A flight attendant wakes up in the wrong hotel, in the wrong bed, with a dead man – and no idea what happened. Cassandra Bowden is no stranger to hungover mornings. She’s a binge drinker, her job with the airline making it easy to find adventure, and the occasional blackouts seem to be inevitable. Afraid to call the police, Cassie begins to lie.
Read more and sample the audio.

 

 

2. Look For Me by Lisa Gardner, narrated by Kirsten Potter

Look For Me.

The home of a family of five is now a crime scene: four are savagely murdered, and a 16-year-old girl is missing. Was she lucky to escape? Or is her absence evidence of something sinister? Detective D.D. Warren is on the case, but so is the survivor-turned-avenger Flora Dane. Seeking different types of justice, they must make sense of the clues left behind by a young woman who, whether a victim or suspect, is silently pleading.
Read more and sample the audio.

 

 

3. The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah, narrated by Julia Whelan

The Great Alone.

Alaska, 1974. Unpredictable. Unforgiving. Untamed. For a family in crisis, the ultimate test of survival. Ernt Allbright, a former POW, comes home from the Vietnam war a changed and volatile man. When he loses yet another job, he makes an impulsive decision: he will move his family north, to Alaska, where they will live off the grid in America’s last true frontier.
Read more and sample the audio.

 

 

4. The Shape Of Water by Daniel Kraus and Guillermo Del Toro, narrated by Jenna Lamia

The Shape Of Water.

The Shape of Water is set in Cold War-era Baltimore at the Occam Aerospace Research Center, which has recently received its most sensitive asset ever: an amphibious man captured in the Amazon. What unfolds is a stirring romance between the asset and one of the janitors on staff, a mute woman who uses sign language to communicate with the creature.
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5. The Escape Artist by Brad Meltzer, narrated by Scott Brick and January LaVoy

The Escape Artist.

Who is Nola Brown? Nola is a mystery. Nola is trouble. And Nola is supposed to be dead. Her body was found on a plane that mysteriously fell from the sky as it left a secret military base in the Alaskan wilderness. Her commanding officer verifies she’s dead. The U.S. government confirms it. But Jim “Zig” Zigarowski has just found out the truth: Nola is still alive. And on the run.
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Non-Fiction

1. Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin’s War on America and the Election of Donald Trump by David Corn and Michael Isikoff, narrated by Peter Ganim

Russian Roulette.

The incredible, harrowing account of how American democracy was hacked by Moscow as part of a covert operation to influence the U.S. election and help Donald Trump gain the presidency.
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2. Girl, Wash Your Face: Stop Believing the Lies About Who You Are so You Can Become Who You Were Meant to Be by Rachel Hollis, narrated by Rachel Hollis

Girl, Wash Your Face.

With wry wit and hard-earned wisdom, popular online personality and founder of TheChicSite.com founder Rachel Hollis helps readers break free from the lies keeping them from the joy-filled and exuberant life they are meant to have.
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3. The Kremlin’s Candidate by Jason Matthews, narrated by Jeremy Bobb

The Kremlin's Candidate.

In the final, thrilling installment of the Red Sparrow Trilogy, Russian counterintelligence chief Dominika Egorova and her lover, CIA agent Nate Nash, must find a Russian agent about to be appointed to a very high office in the US government.
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4. I’ll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer by Michelle McNamara, narrated by Gabra Zackman

I'll Be Gone.

A masterful true crime account of the Golden State Killer-the elusive serial rapist turned murderer who terrorized California for over a decade-from Michelle McNamara, the gifted journalist who died tragically while investigating the case.
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5. Educated by Tara Westover, narrated by Julia Whelan

Educated.

An unforgettable memoir 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 seventeen 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.
Read more and sample the audio.