“I read a handful of memoirs to get a sense of what the genre meant. I needed to learn the fundamentals of the craft. I had never written a word of narrative. What is a tense shift, what is point of view? I didn't know any of it.”

American memoirist, essayist and historian

Tara Westover is an American memoirist, essayist, and historian. She is best known for her memoir Educated, published in 2018, which became a No. 1 New York Times bestseller and drew major award recognition. The book also helped make her a widely noted public figure in recent years. Educated was a finalist for several national honors, including the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, PEN America’s Jean Stein Book Award, and two National Book Critics Circle awards. The New York Times named it one of the 10 best books of 2018, and Time included Westover among its 100 most influential people of 2019.