Becoming
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4.5 • 11.4K Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
An intimate, powerful, and inspiring memoir by the former First Lady of the United States
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • WATCH THE EMMY-NOMINATED NETFLIX ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARY • OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB PICK • NAACP IMAGE AWARD WINNER • ONE OF ESSENCE’S 50 MOST IMPACTFUL BLACK BOOKS OF THE PAST 50 YEARS
In a life filled with meaning and accomplishment, Michelle Obama has emerged as one of the most iconic and compelling women of our era. As First Lady of the United States of America—the first African American to serve in that role—she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments. Along the way, she showed us a few dance moves, crushed Carpool Karaoke, and raised two down-to-earth daughters under an unforgiving media glare.
In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it—in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations—and whose story inspires us to do the same.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
If, like most of us, you harbor a strong suspicion that you could be friends with Michelle Obama, her warm, insightful memoir will make you 100 percent sure of that. Becoming offers intimate glimpses into Obama’s Chicago childhood, her father’s long illness, and her struggle to balance her desire for excellence with her search for a truly fulfilling professional path. It also, of course, dwells on her experiences as a historic public figure. Never overtly political but often satisfyingly pointed, Obama’s book is a profound pleasure, offering a desperately needed reminder that, sometimes, grace and intelligence do prevail.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The former first lady looks back on an unlikely rise to the top while navigating issues of race and gender in this warmhearted memoir. Obama's narrative is the story of an African-American striver, born to a working-class family in a Chicago ghetto, who got Princeton and Harvard degrees and prominent jobs in law and public relations, attended at every step by the nagging question, "Am I good enough?" ("Yes I am," she answers). It's also about her struggle to keep husband Barack's high-powered political career from subsuming her identity and the placid family life she preferred to the electoral frenzy she disavows any desire for public office herself while she weathered misgivings over work-life balance and marital strains that required couples' counseling. Becoming the first lady ratchets up the pressure as Obama endures the Secret Service security bubble, has every public utterance and outfit attacked by opponents, gets pilloried as a closet radical, and soldiers on with healthy-food initiatives. Obama surveys most of this with calm good humor "infuriating" Republican obstructionism and Donald Trump's "misogyny" draw her ire while painting an admiring, sometimes romantic portrait of Barack and evoking pathos over her parents' sacrifices for their children. There are no dramatic revelations and not much overt politics here, but fans of the Obamas will find an interesting, inspiring saga of quiet social revolutions. Photos.
Customer Reviews
Love love love
Inspiration, exceptional loving person
Wonderful!
As our past American First Lady, she has been quite forgotten. Or so you think... This book is very inspiring and really brings out the empowerment of women of color. Looking for more people to become just as amazing as Michelle.
Becoming
From the excerpts I read (which is obvious many that gave the book a 1 rating did not but instead rated it purely based on their own hate and prejudice for the Obamas), it seems that she is allowing us into her more private life, sharing her personal pains as well as her public pains of being the first African American First Lady. I am very excited to read it and feel it will be a wonderful book.