Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth - Sarah Smarsh

Title: Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth

Author: Sarah Smarsh

Publish Date: September 18, 2018

Publisher: Scribner

Format: Kindle

Page Count: 288 pages

Source: Library

Date Read: May 13-14, 2020

 

Review

I think this book was much better representation of the white working class/poor than Educated or Hillbilly Elegy. First off, Smarsh backs up her memoirs with studies and reports. Second, Smarsh understands and acknowledges her privilege and works hard to include POCs, LGBT+, and other minorities that share some of her struggles and also how their struggles differ. Smarsh also doesn't come across as smug like JD Vance or special snowflake like Westover; she has a very conversational writing style to help the reader identify parts of her that they see in themselves. Smarsh highlights the good and the bad about both farming and living in the city in the Midwest; she doesn't try to elevate one or other and this isn't Tragedy Porn like the other two books are. 

 

Smarsh grew up on a farm outside Wichita in the 1980s; when her parent's divorce happened, she moved to Wichita and spent her teen years working hard to break the cycle of poverty and abuse that runs in her family. The way she writes about her family and the land, it is beautiful without being "literary" or too high brow - that is just not Smarsh. She is not confessing any one's sins, she is realistic in that she is not just fifth-generation Kansas farmer, but also she is third-generation daughter of a teenager. So the book is written as though Smarsh is talking to the ghost of her poverty stricken daughter, the one she would have had if she didn't break the cycle. And she did break the cycle, becoming the first in her family to attend and graduate college. But Smarsh doesn't have bitterness - she still has love for the land and her people while also being critical of the situations they face and the ones they get themselves into by the choices they make. 

 

Honestly, it was refreshing to read about Smarsh and her life growing up. Highly recommend!