The Glass Castle: A Memoir (book)

Jeannette Walls was raised by parents who did not make economic security for the family a priority. Her father was an engineer and quick to share his intelligence with his children. He could fix most engines and knew the names of the stars and planets. He was also a hopeless alcoholic, spending his paycheck on booze and leaving everyone’s stomachs empty. Her mother was an artist and writer who never sold a painting or a book. She made no money except when Walls and her siblings pleaded with her to be a teacher—a job she could never hold down because she didn’t like showing up. Her parents were irresponsible, and throughout her entire childhood, Jeannette and her siblings never knew stability. When they lived in California, they camped in the desert and worried for water. When they lived in Arizona, they lived in a house filled with cockroaches that had no locks on the doors. When they lived in West Virginia, winter froze the water, rainstorms poured through holes in the roof, and a mudslide carried the front steps away. There were many instances when, without warning, their father would disappear for a few days, or their mother would refuse to get out of bed, or they wouldn’t have anything to eat. What is captivating is that despite her poor circumstances, Walls developed and maintained a strong internal sense of responsibility (so did her three siblings). If her parents weren’t going to take care of her, then she was going to have to take care of herself, and she started learning early. She taught herself how to cook and do household chores, she made her own braces, she fought off a bigger kid who wanted to rape her, and she learned how to manage the little money that they did have. She developed a spirit of resourcefulness throughout the book that led to her paying her way through college with scholarships and part-time jobs and eventually becoming a published author. The book is well written. It moves at a great pace and kept my attention from cover to cover. I enjoyed her voice as narrator and enjoyed getting to know each member of her family intimately through her eyes. It was beautiful to see her question her circumstances and slowly come to recognize that she both loved her parents for their kindness and intelligence and hated them for their abuse and neglect. Her stories have the full range of human emotion infused into them and are equal parts heartfelt and entertaining. At the end of the book, the kids are all adults and living in New York City. Their parents are living in the city too and are voluntarily homeless. Walls and each of her siblings relates to their parents in different ways, much reflective of each of our own complicated family dynamics. If this book had a message it would be: You can’t choose your family, but you can choose how much responsibility you take for yourself.

The Glass Castle is a fiction book written by Jeanette Walls. The book is based on the author’s true life story with an amazing, remarkable memory that describing her heartbreaking childhood. Jeanette’s dad Rex Walls, a mathematician who came from squalor place in West Virginia. Rex was an alcoholic, stubborn person, who has so many goal and promises in his life but he never accomplished his goal because of his addiction and laziness. Jeanette’s mom, Rose Mary is an artist and teacher, who was raised in an upper middle class family in Phoenix. Rose Mary likes to live in her own world. Jeanette also has siblings, Lori was the oldest, Brain was her younger brother and Maureen was the youngest. Jeanette and her siblings are very strong, smart and are really dependent on their own, they know how to survive. The life style that they were having was depending on the situation, some day they live with comfort but most of the time they wouldn’t have anything to eat and live with discomfort. The family didn’t have much and didn’t want much because Jeanette’s mom didn’t work and her dad change job regularly or got fired because of his attitude. They move from places to places to avoid the bill collectors, lived in the car, sleeping outside in the dessert. Move from one state to another, looking for a new ‘adventure’. Jeanette and her siblings tried to make it best out of it in any ways, but when time goes by thing got harder, Jeanette’s parents didn’t take any effort to make their life better instead things got worse, they stopped caring about the children and thought more about themselves. So the only Jeanette and her siblings can think out of is leave the parents and starts a new life in new place, far away from them and as result they have accomplished they goal and have a better life except Maureen the youngest, who struggle with drugs and got stuck. As well as Rex and Rose Mary, they become homeless because that was the way they wanted to be, later on Rex passed away. The book totally make me sad, anger and mixed emotion. Especially I just became a mom. For instant, how can you raised your child like the way Jeanette’s parents did. Most of the time I just felt like they were so selfish and didn’t really care about the children. Also is so hard to imagine that this can be in real life, is just heartbreaking. I really admire Jeanette and her siblings how strong, dependent and go-getter they are with everything they’ve been through. I really enjoyed reading the book, the detail of the story was really good. The rating that I would give for this inspiring and fascinating book would be a nine to ten. When I started reading the book, it caught me the attention from the beginning until the end. It was more interesting to me when I knew it was based on true story and also you can learn something out of this book, no matter where you come from, rich or poor, how you were raised, if you want to achieve your goal and become somebody in life, you can do it. I recommend this book to everybody.

Jeannette Walls schreibt faszinierend über ihre Kindheit in großer Armut mit völlig unangepassten, unkonventionellen Eltern, deren Traum vom Glass Castle immer wieder zerbricht und die an der Überwindung ihrer eigenen Dämonen immer wieder scheitern. Das Verhältnis der Autorin und ihrer Geschwister zu ihren Eltern ist sowohl von Liebe als auch immer wieder von Verzweiflung und Hassgefühlen geprägt. Dennoch gelingt es den Eltern, ihren Kindern humane Werte zu vermitteln und sie letztendlich zu Kämpfern zu erziehen, die ihren Weg finden und das Leben meistern. Die Kapitel sind kurz, der Stil schnörkellos und direkt, es lässt sich spanend hintereinander weg oder in kleinen "Häppchen" abends vor dem Einschlafen lesen – tolles Buch, super erzählt.

Rlly good

Fantastic book

Great read! Very insightful look into this woman and her families life. It is funny, sad, unbelievable and at times horrific what they went through. Well written descriptions that are both detailed but easy to read. I especially enjoyed the highly philosophical content which really makes you think. Will definitely watch the movie!!!

valió la pena