How I Found Myself in the Midwest: A Memoir of Reinvention

In this passionate testimony to the power of moving forward by going back home, a Midwestern native shares hope in going local. Just after turning forty, Steve Grove left Silicon Valley as a Google executive to move to his home state of Minnesota with his wife and fellow tech exec, Mary Grove, and their one-year-old twins. Gone from the Midwest for two decades, Grove returned home with fresh eyes. Yearning to put down new roots, he traded his career at Google for a position in state government with Governor Tim Walz. Far from working at a fast-paced tech company, Grove’s shift to leading a large government bureaucracy brought a sequence of struggles and triumphs vividly portrayed with both humor and affection. But this story of reinvention takes on new urgency when crisis strikes, as the coronavirus pandemic and the tragic murder of George Floyd unfolds just miles from his newfound home, thrusting Grove’s work into an unexpected spotlight.