A memoir told in poetry equal parts heartbreaking and beautiful, The Secret Lives of Us Kids opens the door to the lives of four siblings trying to survive in the oilfields of northern Montana. The Buckley children grasp hope and each other despite their father’s drinking, their mother’s mental health issues, and their country’s tailspin from the Great Depression to World War II. The hardships and simple pleasures told by Bonnie Buckley Maldonado and her brother Patrick F. Buckley will resound with readers of childhood memoirs, Western history, and poetry alike.