Class: A Memoir of Motherhood, Hunger, and Higher Education

A Good Morning America Book Club Pick New York TimesMost Anticipated Books of Fall Raw and inspiring. People Land is not just exploring her own story, but also the larger implications of what it means to fall between the cracks of American capitalism. The NewYorkTimes From the New York Times bestselling author who inspired the hit Netflix series about a struggling mother barely making ends meet as a housecleanera gripping memoir about college, motherhood, poverty, and life after Maid. When Stephanie Land set out to write her memoir Maid, she never could have imagined what was to come. Handpicked by President Barack Obama as one of the best books of 2019, it was called an eye-opening journey into the lives of the working poor (People). Later it was adapted into the hit Netflix series Maid, which was viewed by 67 million households and was Netflixs fourth most-watched show in 2021, garnering three Primetime Emmy Award nominations. Stephanies escape out of poverty and abuse in search of a better life inspired millions. Maid was a story about a housecleaner, but it was also a story about a woman with a dream. In Class, Land takes us with her as she finishes college and pursues her writing career. Facing barriers at every turn including a byzantine loan system, not having enough money for food, navigating the judgments of professors and fellow students who didnt understand the demands of attending college while under the poverty lineLand finds a way to survive once again, finally graduating in her mid-thirties. Class paints an intimate and heartbreaking portrait of motherhood as it converges and often conflicts with personal desire and professional ambition. Who has the right to create art? Who has the right to go to college? And what kind of work is valued in our culture? In clear, candid, and moving prose, Class grapples with these questions, offering a searing indictment of Americas educational system and an inspiring testimony of a mothers triumph against all odds.