Becoming by Michelle Obama

I had wanted to read Becoming for quite some time, but just had not gotten around to it.  I started reading it and then switched to listening to it.  Michelle narrated the book herself.  Sometimes author narration can be a bad idea and sometimes it works out really well.  It worked out really well in this case.  I enjoyed it a lot. (I listened at 1.5x speed - slower than that didn’t really match how her voice sounded in real life, so having her sped up really made a big difference for me.)


This book was a memoir about her life.  I found it a very interesting story about how she came to be who she was.  I really enjoyed learning what struggles she faced.  Her book really can hit home for all women, people of color, and really anyone who has ever felt like they can’t or shouldn’t be themselves (and working moms - she hits the nail SO MANY TIMES for that one).

Some of my favorite parts of the book involved how she met President Obama, their path to the White House, and how they managed their lives there.  I love how much they love kids, which is really apparent in the book. She really did a lot of great things as First Lady and it was just an interesting viewpoint of her looking back.  I also like how candid she was in relationship strains she and Barack had after having a family.

Perhaps my favorite part of the book came at the very end.  She used bits of Hamilton (yes, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton) to describe the country and where she hopes it goes.  I may have shed a few tears.  She had seen a preview and told him “Good luck with the Hamilton thing.”  HA!!  Later she said, “Hamilton touched me because it reflected the kind of history I’d lived myself. It told a story that allowed diversity in.”

A few of my favorite quotes from the book (hard to list many since I book marked them audio clip style):

• Like a lot of girls, I became aware of the liabilities of my body early, long before I began to even look like a woman.

• If you don’t get out there and define yourself, you’ll be quickly and inaccurately defined by others.

• Now I think it’s one of the most useless questions an adult can ask a child—What do you want to be when you grow up? As if growing up is finite. As if at some point you become something and that’s the end.

448 pages/19h 3m