First published 2014
Elizabeth Warren grows up in small-town Oklahoma dreaming of college and teaching elementary school. Her family has little money, making even modest goals seem impossible. Marriage and children arrive early, pushing her ambitions further away. Fifteen years pass before she becomes a law professor studying bankruptcy. Washington calls with an offer to help rewrite bankruptcy laws. Warren enters a world of political combat she never expected. She battles for better bankruptcy protections for a decade and loses every fight. The financial crisis brings new opportunities to hold government accountable, but big banks target her efforts. She creates the idea for a consumer protection agency, then watches others run it. At sixty-two, Warren faces her biggest choice yet. She enters the Senate race that the entire country will watch. Her story reveals why she fights for working families and what drove her to challenge the system that repeatedly defeated her.
Genres: family-life, political-science, contemporary, social-issues, biography-memoir
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: overcoming-adversity, underdog
Setting: Oklahoma, Washington
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
365 pages · Hardcover · Metropolitan Books