Reviews - Lowborn: Growing Up, Getting Away and Returning to Britain's Poorest Towns

269 reviews for:

Lowborn: Growing Up, Getting Away and Returning to Britain's Poorest Towns

Kerry Hudson

4.19 AVERAGE

amyrandles1's review against another edition

4.5

challenging dark reflective sad slow-paced

Content Warnings

heathermackenzie's review against another edition

5.0

dark emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Fascinating insight into growing up poor in the UK. I found the flashback format a little annoying at the beginning, but by the end enjoyed the parallel look at her life then and now, and how the areas had changed (or not).

tatterededges's review against another edition

3.0

I wanted to love this book but instead I found it kind of bland and repetitive. Each new town she visited presented more of the same in both content and context and having finished the book I would struggle to even recall which towns they even were. (Full disclosure, I’m geographically challenged so this might be more a reflection on me than the author).

Her childhood growing up in poverty and neglect would have been horrendous, I’m in no doubt about that however, it seemed like the author told us her childhood was horrible, instead of actually telling us ‘about’ her childhood.

She discloses later in the book that she doesn’t actually remember a lot of her childhood and while that’s probably true, I felt that she held back a lot of what she went through. That is her prerogative but if you’re going to write a book about what it’s like to grow up in poverty and neglect, you should be prepared to elaborate. The devil is in the details as they say and sadly, for this book there just weren’t that many details.

It’s obvious that this book was cathartic for the author and visiting the places she grew up was therapeutic as she writes her memoir without any trace of bitterness or anger. She’s not resentful or blaming of her mother, though she’d be within her rights to be and she retells events, particularly those relating to her own actions without apology. I really appreciated this aspect of her writing, I feel this level of objectivity adds to the credibility and integrity of the story.

Finally, I agree with her assessment that poverty begets poverty. We don’t live in a meritocracy and the systems in place to protect those most vulnerable are broken, underfunded and under resourced.

mc_psychotherapy's review against another edition

4.75

emotional informative inspiring sad medium-paced

collette13's review against another edition

4.0

challenging dark emotional informative sad medium-paced

fulloflemons's review against another edition

5.0

dark emotional hopeful informative reflective sad medium-paced

Content Warnings

jacki_f's review against another edition

3.0

Kerry Hudson grew up in poverty. Born in Aberdeen and raised in both England and Scotland, she lived with her mother and occasionally her stepfather. She writes this story as an adult who "escaped" poverty, revisiting the places where she lived and talking about her experiences in those places. It's a very personal story rather than a broader look at poverty. Her experiences feel specific rather than generic. And yes she was most definitely poor but she also suffered because of her mother's mental health and the frequent moves which could have happened regardless of the family income. I was more interested in Kerry's story than in her observations revisiting the towns or in her frequent angst about writing the book at all.