Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis

I got an ARC of this book at BookExpo last year, read a few pages, and passed on it. Then came the rave reviews. Darn, I thought, and I put myself on the hold list at the library. #58, or something ridiculous like that. I'd check every few days, but the list really didn't seem to move much. Weeks went by. Months went by. Finally, last week the book finally came in.

Was it simply that anticipation built up my expectations? I don't know, but I walked away from this book thinking it was just another sad family story. J. D. Vance made good from an awful childhood, and that's something, but honestly the chief draw is the druggie mom and a succession of dad and dad surrogates. I must live in a hillbilly enclave; I see these sorts of families all around me in struggling-white-America. Relationship mistakes. Limited employment options. Too many kids to properly care for. A sad story, yes, but I would have wished for a bit more time to have passed so that our author was able to reflect more and write better.