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Mar 03, 2020
I don’t think I have to explain who Michelle Obama is, right? I will tell you that Michelle Robinson was born and raised in Chicago, grew up in a small apartment rented from relatives along with her older brother, and worked her ass off to get into Princeton, followed by Harvard Law. She went on to practice law at a prestigious firm in Chicago, which is where she met a young man with a funny name. I won’t reveal any more, but I will say that Becoming takes you all the way from Michelle’s early childhood to the end of her tenure as First Lady, with many twists along the way. I will freely admit that of this book’s three sections (Becoming Me, Becoming Us, and Becoming More), Becoming Me was my favourite by a mile. Obama writes about her childhood with such fondness and warmth, while painting an honest, not always flattering picture of what the South Side of Chicago would have been like for a young black girl. She acknowledges often how lucky she was in every step of her schooling and early career - to find the right mentors, who introduced her to the right opportunities, which set her on the path to success. Many of the programs Obama later established were specifically designed to help the kids who didn’t get those lucky breaks, no matter how hard working they (and their parents) might be. The third section, Becoming More, was fun to read in that voyeuristic, peeking-behind-the-curtain way - this part of the book spans the Obamas’ two terms in the White House. It was really just the middle section, the narrative of Michelle and Barack’s relationship pre-presidency, that didn’t grip me as much, but I understand that it was necessary to the narrative as a whole. Overall, Becoming is well-written and highly readable - I’d happily pick another book by Michelle Obama should she write one!