Content warning ⚠️: child abuse, domestic violence, rape, drug abuse, alcohol abuse

Snyder, an advocate reporting on social issues impacting the lives of women worldwide, shared her own story in this memoir. After her mother’s death, Rachel was forced to move across the country with her father and abandon her mother’s Jewish heritage as her father demanded participation in his family’s stringent evangelical church. Snyder details the struggles and abuse she endured as a child, her rebellion and history of substance misuse, and how she eventually came to enjoy education and used it as a path out of her life. She eventually travelled the globe, first on a semester at sea and later as a journalist, and then settled in Cambodia. When she later returned to the United States to care for a sick family member, it is with a much different perspective than the one she left with.

Thank you to @netgalley for the ARC! I listened to this on audiobook and the performance was great and was read by the author. There was a lot of discussion about substance abuse, which was a big part of Snyder’s story, but I was a little surprised that so much of the book discussed this as it wasn’t mentioned at all in the description. I would have loved to hear more about Snyder’s experiences abroad, and I’m hoping those are touched in more in her nonfiction work about domestic violence called No Visible Bruises, which I added to my TBR about this. As a journalist Snyder has spent hours researching and writing about domestic violence, and her memoir definitely adds a lot of context to her life’s work. Readers who enjoyed Educated would probably enjoy this, although I did find it a lot heavier than Educated at times, so sensitive readers may want to pay mind to content warnings.