Stephanie Land

STEPHANIE LAND is the author of the bestselling debut memoir Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive. She recounts her harrowing saga as a single mom navigating the poverty trap. Her unflinching and inspiring testimony exposes the physical, economic, and social brutality that domestic workers face, all while radiating a parent’s hope and resilience. At age 28, when Land’s dream of attending college and becoming a writer is deferred she and her seven-month old daughter have to move into a homeless shelter, fleeing a violent home and lacking any form of reliable safety net. Mired in patronizing government processes and paltry wages, Land illustrates the trauma of grasping for stability from a rigged system, and demonstrates how hard work doesn’t always pay off. Land’s memoir offers a unique and essential perspective from the frontlines of struggle, and reveals the real culprits of the situation: domestic violence, untenable minimum wages, high housing costs, and government assistance programs that fail the people they ostensibly serve. The book will be adapted as a series for Netflix by John Wells Productions (ER, The West Wing, Shameless) and Margot Robbie’s LuckyChap Entertainment. After years of barely scraping by, Land graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Montana in 2014, and started a career as a freelance writer. She has been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Vox, and Salon, among many other outlets. She has worked with Barbara Ehrenreich at the Economic Hardship Reporting Project, and is a writing fellow at the Center for Community Change. @stepville