Picked as . BBC News Online 's Books to Look Ahead in 2018 Mail on Sunday 's Best of 2018 Cultural Highlights New York Times 's Must-Know Literary Events in 2018 Stylist 's One to Watch in 2018 Daily Express 's Must-Have New Reads The Pool 's Books We're Looking Forward to in 2018 S Magazine 's Best Upcoming Books of 2018 Vogue 's What to Read This Fall 'Educated is an unflinching account of love and brutality, of the strength of blood ties and the power of imagination, and of a young woman whose intellect, self-knowledge and courage illuminate every page. There are passages so painfully vivid that they sear themselves into the memory . Both the book and its writer are remarkable in every respect' Sarah Perry, author of The Essex Serpent 'This fiercely intelligent memoir is a fascinating and compassionate view of another world and the author's struggle to both escape from and understand it as she heads out into the world' The Pool 'An astonishing and uplifting story about the transformative power of education' Mail on Sunday Tara Westover grew up preparing for the End of Days, watching for the sun to darken, for the moon to drip as if with blood. She spent her summers bottling peaches and her winters rotating emergency supplies, hoping that when the World of Men failed, her family would continue on, unaffected. She hadn't been registered for a birth certificate. She had no school records because she'd never set foot in a classroom, and no medical records because her father didn't believe in doctors or hospitals. According to the state and federal government, she didn't exist.

As she grew older, her father became more radical, and her brother, more violent. At sixteen Tara decided to educate herself. Her struggle for knowledge would take her far from her Idaho mountains, over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge. Only then would she wonder if she'd travelled 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 the severing of the closest of ties. With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, from her singular experience 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.