The sound of gravel : a memoir / Ruth Wariner.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

An instant New York Times bestseller

"A haunting, harrowing testament to survival." -- People Magazine


"An addictive chronicle of a polygamist community." -- New York Magazine

"Unforgettable" -- Entertainment Weekly

The thirty-ninth of her father's forty-two children, Ruth Wariner grew up in polygamist family on a farm in rural Mexico. In The Sound of Gravel , she offers an unforgettable portrait of the violence that threatened her community, her family's fierce sense of loyalty, and her own unshakeable belief in the possibility of a better life. An intimate, gripping tale of triumph and courage, The Sound of Gravel is a heart-stopping true story.

Reviews provided by Syndetics

Library Journal Review

Wariner's first book, relating her childhood bouncing between El Paso, TX, and Colonia LeBaron, a polygamist Mormon colony in northern Mexico, depicts the events that led her to flee from the colony at age 15, when she and her older brother smuggled their younger siblings across the U.S. border to escape her neglectful and sexually abusive stepfather. The author's complicated relationship with her late mother; her observations about the inner workings of a polygamist community; and her questions about family, faith, and what it means to be on the right life path take readers on an intense coming-of-age journey. After settling in the United States, Wariner raised three of her younger siblings on her own. Told from the perspective of Wariner as a teen, this account is at turns poignant and tragic; a raw, engrossing chronicle of inner strength and survival. VERDICT This book will appeal to memoir lovers as well as readers interested in polygamist culture or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.-Crystal Goldman, Univ. of -California, San Diego Lib. © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Publishers Weekly Review

Wariner is her mother's fourth daughter and her father's 39th child. So begins this intense memoir of growing up in a sect of polygamous Mormons who are striving to build a utopia in the Mexican desert. The men tend the cows and do odd jobs in the States, while the women tend their children and their pregnancies and make regular trips into El Paso to pick up welfare benefits. Wariner's dad is murdered by a rival when the author is three, and her mom replaces him with Lane, whom Wariner comes to abhor. Poverty and jealousy are enormous stressors. Sister-wives fight for resources, and Lane isn't much of a provider. A fight over which wife deserves a new showerhead leads to Lane viciously beating Wariner's mother, and she flees with the kids to her parents' home in California. The author spends blissful months enjoying chocolate ice cream and hot showers before her mother succumbs to Lane's charms and her own convictions and returns the family to the colony. Squalor and child abuse follow, and the family grinds apathetically along until Lane's mismanagement of life brings a final crisis. By age 15, Wariner has had enough. Fed up with hearing "It's God's will" whenever something goes wrong, she rescues herself and then eventually writes this memoir, which condemns using religion to evade moral responsibility. This well-written book is hard to put down and hard to forget. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

School Library Journal Review

Wariner, whose deceased father had 42 children, grew up in a polygamous Mormon cult town in Mexico. Even though it was the 1970s, having electricity and plumbing in the house was a struggle, and many of her siblings were developmentally disabled, and Ruth had to care for them. Her family moved often-California, Texas, New Mexico, and back to Mexico when all else failed. Schooling wasn't important, but learning how to make fresh bread and to clean house for her future husband was. In honest, posttherapy fashion, Ruth explains how her mother didn't divorce her stepfather after physical spousal abuse and repeated sexual abuse of his daughters; the girls were supposed to forgive him instead. With no self-pity, Ruth doesn't apologize for her mother's actions-she is grateful for the love of her mother and siblings, though she knows that escaping their stepfather is what ultimately saved them. Teens will root for Ruth and her siblings to survive, cry when the young woman is abused, and fear for the family when things go wrong. VERDICT Fast-paced, sincere, and gut-wrenching, just like Jeannette Walls's The Glass Castle; this is a must-purchase memoir for high school libraries.-Sarah Hill, Lake Land College, Mattoon, IL © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Booklist Review

Wariner was her father's thirty-ninth child (of 42). Growing up in a polygamous Mormon colony in Mexico, she never thought that life would hold anything more for her than motherhood through marriage with a man who would be supporting several families. As she relates in detail in this haunting memoir, however, her childhood revealed a dark side to the relationships in her own family. For Wariner, life in a polygamous family meant hardship and abuse, which she describes through the heartbreaking perspective of the girl she was. Through experiences such as staying with her grandparents in the States, she slowly learns to expect more from life. Rather than delving into the particulars of the community's beliefs, Wariner reveals them as they arise during otherwise everyday routines, much as a child slowly learns the workings of the world around her. This gives great depth to the portrayal of her situation and to the characterizations of her mother and stepfather. With power and insight, Wariner's tale shows a road to escape from the most confining circumstances.--Thoreson, Bridget Copyright 2015 Booklist

Kirkus Book Review

A high school Spanish teacher's memoir about a peripatetic, often turbulent childhood and adolescence spent among fundamentalist Mormons. Wariner, her "mother's fourth child and her father's thirty-ninth," grew up in the small fundamentalist Mormon colony of LeBaron in northern Mexico. Chaos dominated her early life: one of her eldest siblings was prone to fits of extreme aggression, and when the author was 3 months old, her father was murdered. By the time she was 3, her mother, Kathy, had become the second wife of another colonist named Lane. But rather than bring stability to the family, the marriage only seemed to exacerbate the chaos. Lane and her mother argued and fought, sometimes violently. And while Kathy tried to sever the relationship by leaving LeBaron, she always found herself going back to her husband and bearing more children, whom she supported with government welfare checks. Wariner's own relationship to her parents grew increasingly strained as she became older. In elementary school, Lane began to sexually abuse her. The author told Kathy about the abuse, but it continued into her teenage years. Desperate for "attention and adoration" from Lane, Kathy told her daughter she should "be more Christlike" and forgive her stepfather for his trespasses so as to keep the family together. After a freak accident that killed both Kathy and one of her younger siblings, Wariner discovered that Lane was also abusing her younger, developmentally delayed brother, Luke. With the help of another brother, who had gone to California to make a life for himself, 16-year-old Wariner took her remaining siblings to the United States, where she raised her three youngest sisters on her own. Engrossingly readable from start to finish, the book not only offers a riveting portrayal of life in a polygamist community. It also celebrates the powerful bond between siblings determined to not only survive their circumstances, but also thrive in spite of them. An unsentimental yet wholly moving memoir. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.