by Sarah Smarsh
First published 2018
Sarah Smarsh tells the story of growing up in rural Kansas during the 1980s and 1990s, where cyclical poverty trapped her family among the working poor. Born into a lineage of fifth generation wheat farmers and teen mothers, Smarsh lived with her dissatisfied young mother and was raised primarily by her grandmother on a farm thirty miles west of Wichita. The memoir examines how America's shifting economic policies cemented her family's economic struggles across generations. Smarsh weaves together personal narrative with sharp cultural analysis to expose the class divide in America and challenge common myths about people who earn less. She reveals how intergenerational poverty corrodes individuals, families, and entire communities. The book offers an uncompromising examination of what it means to have less in a country defined by excess, giving readers an intimate view into the lives of poor and working class Americans in the heartland.
Genres: family-life, autobiography, class, memoir, non-fiction, biography-memoir, cultural-studies, american-history
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: coming-of-age, family-saga, social-commentary
Setting: Kansas, Wichita
Period: 1980s, 1990s
290 pages · Hardcover · Scribner