| | |  | Travel | Home » » The Glass Castle: A Memoir | | | | | | | Description: | | Jeannette Walls grew up with parents whose ideals and stubborn nonconformity were both their curse and their salvation. Rex and Rose Mary Walls had four children. In the beginning, they lived like nomads, moving among Southwest desert towns, camping in the mountains. Rex was a charismatic, brilliant man who, when sober, captured his children's imagination, teaching them physics, geology, and above all, how to embrace life fearlessly. Rose Mary, who painted and wrote and couldn't stand the responsibility of providing for her family, called herself an "excitement addict." Cooking a meal that would be consumed in fifteen minutes had no appeal when she could make a painting that might last forever.Later, when the money ran out, or the romance of the wandering life faded, the Walls retreated to the dismal West Virginia mining town -- and the family -- Rex Walls had done everything he could to escape. He drank. He stole the grocery money and disappeared for days. As the dysfunction of the family escalated, Jeannette and her brother and sisters had to fend for themselves, supporting one another as they weathered their parents' betrayals and, finally, found the resources and will to leave home. What is so astonishing about Jeannette Walls is not just that she had the guts and tenacity and intelligence to get out, but that she describes her parents with such deep affection and generosity. Hers is a story of triumph against all odds, but also a tender, moving tale of unconditional love in a family that despite its profound flaws gave her the fiery determination to carve out a successful life on her own terms. For two decades, Jeannette Walls hid her roots. Now she tells her own story. A regular contributor to MSNBC.com, she lives in New York and Long Island and is married to the writer John Taylor. | | | Features: | |
• ISBN13: 9780743247542
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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| | | Product Details: | | | Author:
| Jeannette Walls | | Paperback:
| 288 pages | | Publisher:
| Scribner | | Publication Date:
| January 09, 2006 | | Language:
| English | | ISBN:
| 074324754X | | Package Length:
| 8.0 inches | | Package Width:
| 5.2 inches | | Package Height:
| 0.7 inches | | Package Weight:
| 0.45 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 1336 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
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 A Happy EndingNov 19, 2009
Jeanette Walls's Glass Castle was a compelling story that is both familiar and unfamiliar to the common reader. Her real life horror story ultimately renews faith in human beings. Despite the horror these kids face throughout their childhood, they get a fairy tale happy ending. Glass Castle makes you wonder if you could survive an upbringing like this one and live to tell about it.
The memoir begins with meeting the Walls family living in a dilapidated trailer of a home. Jeanette's earliest memory is of cooking hotdogs at the age of three and badly burning herself with boiling water. What a terrible first memory to have. What kind of lucid parents would allow their three-year old to cook on a stove? These kinds of horrible stories occur throughout the book, and are why the book is so interesting to read. The average person isn't familiar with that sort of neglect therefore Glass Castle familiarizes you with what it would be like to be part of a family like Jeanette's. It's hard to sympathize with parents who have potential to provide a stable lifestyle for their family but refuse to act upon it. Rex was a mastermind with his hands, holding down jobs as an electrician, and drawing up architectural plans for the "glass castle". Jeanette's mother Rose Mary had a college degree for teaching but refused to hold down a stable career because it simply bored her. The book was difficult to put down because it constantly kept you guessing what kind of ridiculous things you'll come across next.
The memoir, familiar to the reader, shows us a family that is trying desperately to live the American Dream while going through trials and tribulations. What's not relatable to the reader, the fact that they screw it up every single time. The kids became very acquainted with a practice known as the "skedaddle." This was something Rex invented to run from the government who wanted to collect taxes and wanted payments on bills. The family bounced from Arizona, to California, and to West Virginia. In all these places they had a chance to start over, but all of these dreams were shattered when the parents started back on their old ways. Readers can sympathize with struggle and failure, yet the parent's malfunction in providing for their children time and time again becomes irreconcilable. The one redeeming quality of the novel is that the family tries desperately to stick together even when it's bad for them. Even when the kids were at points of near-starvation, they would always find a way to stay on their feet by working together. Whether this meant holding down odd jobs, or scrounging for food in school trash cans, they managed to get by. This is an admirable trait, because ultimately the reader wants the family to make it through.
Glass Castle makes you realize that all the awful things you thought couldn't happen, can. Most parents have warned their children about perverts while not really believing it could happen. Here, it happens in many different ways. Phoenix was very hot during the summer. Rex and Rose Mary saw the only way to cool the house was by leaving the doors and windows open at all times, even at night. Perverts entered the house, Jeanette was molested by one, and the parents didn't even show concern at this disgusting act against their daughter, let alone agree to lock the door. Throughout the book instances of molestation or near molestation occur right under the parent's noses. How could you allow such a thing to happen to your children? This book opens your eyes as to the fact that these things have to be happening more so than we commonly think.
Throughout the book the family drags you through their living nightmare to finally renew your faith in a happy ending. In the middle of the squalor of Welch WV, Jeanette finds her true calling in. She becomes involved in her high school newspaper and falls in love with the idea of writing for a career. She vows to herself to get out of Welch and out of the hold her parents have on her terrible life. At this point in the novel you finally feel a little sense of relief that these kids will make it out. After raising money on their own, they flee their parents grasp and head to New York City. There they find jobs, and create relationships and families of their own. As a reader, we finally see a happy ending that justifies the struggle.
Glass Castle is a story of the redemption of a family and the struggle to live the American dream. It's a story of starting over and realizing that people regardless of their past can have a future. Despite having hell for a childhood, these kids bonded together and walked through fire and came out alive.
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 Wonderfully engaging memoirNov 18, 2009
Ms Walls has written an amazing memoir. She tells her story with humor and without self-pity. This is one of those books that you tell everyone you know to read. It's one of those rare ones that I will keep and re-read. Great job! Looking forward to reading her other books.
Your first teachers.....Nov 18, 2009
are always your parents. Jeannette Walls learned a lot from her parents, despite the hardships and abuse. Luckily she was able glean the positive lessons: to dream, from her father, and to pursue her artistic talents, from her mother. Her parents were obviously mentally ill people and I figure she knows that now but did not understand that as a child. Her fascinating memoir was fast paced and seems like a series of slides, making it somewhat shattered, like her life, but I could not put it down. The writing style is more journalistic than literary, but the story makes up for all that. While reading it I did wonder how she remembered all the early years, but I supposed that she and her siblings must have discussed them, they seemed believable. I recommend this book and I am not a fan of autobiography in general, though I did love Angela's Ashes and do plan to read The Liar's Club now.
Fantastic bookNov 18, 2009
This book grabs your attention starting on page one, plus its very humerous; sometimes i would re-read parts because it was so funny!
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
The glass castleNov 17, 2009
The book was fascinating, couldn't put it down. Here in middle America we don't
see many homeless people but I am sure this type of living is much more common
than we think. The book points out that with determination and hard work people
can overcome childhood problems and make a good life. Some people will always
be unusual so maybe it's not necessary to try to change them!!
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