This is a gut-wrenching but an endearing memoir.

It’s a story of a girl growing up in a paranoiac family that doesn’t believe in public schools, Holocaust, government agencies and with many other quirks. It’s also a story of living through a physically abusive and mentally tormented upbringing.

If I sound gloom, hold your horses. It is an endearing story of someone who went from no schooling to getting a Ph.D in just a span of ten years through sheer grit and perseverance.

This is soulful reminder of counting one’s blessings and privileges that we all take for granted. Simple acts of going to a school or visiting a hospital or wearing a fashionable dress are indeed a privilege and luxury for certain people.

One of the wonderful books I listened through this year. Eerily it reminded me of the Netflix’s documentary Wild Wild Country for the cult like beliefs upheld by many characters in this.