True Story Book Club: Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive by Stephanie Land
Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother's Will to Survive by Stephanie Land (270 pages)
At 28, Stephanie Land’s plans of breaking free from the roots of her hometown in the Pacific Northwest to chase her
dreams of attending a university and becoming a writer, were cut short when a summer fling turned into an unexpected
pregnancy. She turned to housekeeping to make ends meet, and with a tenacious grip on her dream to provide her
daughter the very best life possible, Stephanie worked days and took classes online to earn a college degree, and began
to write relentlessly.
Maid explores the underbelly of upper-middle class America and the reality of what it’s like to be in service to them. “I’d
become a nameless ghost,” Stephanie writes about her relationship with her clients, many of whom do not know her from
any other cleaner, but who she learns plenty about. As she begins to discover more about her clients’ lives-their sadness
and love, too-she begins to find hope in her own path.
Her writing as a journalist gives voice to the "servant" worker, and those pursuing the American Dream from below the
poverty line. Maid is Stephanie’s story, but it’s not her alone.
