Cinder Girl: Growing Up on America's Fringe

by Holly Rehder

Cinder Girl sits in the rarest class of memoir — a towering literary triumph which melds searing and tragic personal history with an incredible story of resilience, hope, and civic success.

Growing up on welfare, food stamps, and Greyhound buses, Holly Thompson Rehder quit school at fifteen to help take care of her mother and younger sister after a devastating car accident. Getting married and pregnant soon thereafter, like so many other young girls caught in the poverty-cycle, Holly decided that the life she had been born into was not what she intended to give her child.

But unlike others who wind up mired in a lifetime of poverty, dysfunction, and despair, Holly used her resourcefulness, faith, and sheer stubborn American grit to fight her way out of the gutter.

Two decades later she was a successful businesswoman. And today, she is a rising political star who serves as an inspiration to young women across the state of Missouri—and indeed, the entire nation—all while never forgetting where she came from. She worked her butt off to help so many others born into seemingly helpless circumstances.

As a rare lawmaker who speaks candidly from raw personal experience, in Cinder Girl , Rehder rises above standard political prose to provide an unvarnished look inside the worst of American poverty––those living in the margins. Rehder challenges us to recall the plight of those far less fortunate, who struggle without the opportunities most of us take for granted.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir

320 pages, Hardcover

Published August 9, 2022

Reviews

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Motivating and inspirational.

[Jacquelyne Hernandez · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.75 rounded up. It was a book. A little boring at times, but okay. Though the story is inspiring, I felt like it could have been edited to be more cohesive. The themes and message seem to change twice; once after the first 2 chapters, and then again within the last 100 pages. The synopsis teases that there would be a new perspective on poverty and America's fringes, but there really isn't. Had it just been marketed as a memoir I think this detail would not have bothered me as much. Rehder does not offer her view on it politically at all, in fact she only mentions being a senator sparingly, and doesn't provide the political insight I was hoping for. It's not a bad story, just a little boring at times, but that's mostly due to the editing style of the book. Overall, the reading experience of it was fine, though really nothing to write home about.

[Bobbi Hollinsworth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very inspirational book! Makes me think of how many children are growing up like this every day.

[Caryl Matisko · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great story of the "system" that many get stuck in.

[Brandi Dredge · Rating 5 out of 5]

Powerful and inspiring read that stayed with me long after I closed the book.

[Big Cowboy Hat Garfield · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hillbilly Eulogy wishes it was this book.

[Allison Berkson · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was a book. She summarized the events of her life. It lacks anything beyond that that would give the book some substance.

[Leah DeMarest · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed it. It gives light to the barriers of poverty, mental illness, domestic violence, and addiction and inspires others to see dreams can be achievable no matter your background.