The Glass Castle: A Memoir | 
 enlarge | Author: Jeannette Walls
Publisher: Scribner
Category: EBooks
List Price: $11.99
Buy New: $9.59
You Save: $2.40 (20%)
Rating:  1160 reviews
Sales Rank: 97
Format: Kindle Book
Media: Kindle Edition
Pages: 288
Number Of Items: 1
Dewey Decimal Number: 362.82092
ASIN: B000OVLKMM
Publication Date: March 23, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com Review
Jeannette Walls's father always called her "Mountain Goat" and there's perhaps no more apt nickname for a girl who navigated a sheer and towering cliff of childhood both daily and stoically. In The Glass Castle, Walls chronicles her upbringing at the hands of eccentric, nomadic parents--Rose Mary, her frustrated-artist mother, and Rex, her brilliant, alcoholic father. To call the elder Walls's childrearing style laissez faire would be putting it mildly. As Rose Mary and Rex, motivated by whims and paranoia, uprooted their kids time and again, the youngsters (Walls, her brother and two sisters) were left largely to their own devices. But while Rex and Rose Mary firmly believed children learned best from their own mistakes, they themselves never seemed to do so, repeating the same disastrous patterns that eventually landed them on the streets. Walls describes in fascinating detail what it was to be a child in this family, from the embarrassing (wearing shoes held together with safety pins; using markers to color her skin in an effort to camouflage holes in her pants) to the horrific (being told, after a creepy uncle pleasured himself in close proximity, that sexual assault is a crime of perception; and being pimped by her father at a bar). Though Walls has well earned the right to complain, at no point does she play the victim. In fact, Walls' removed, nonjudgmental stance is initially startling, since many of the circumstances she describes could be categorized as abusive (and unquestioningly neglectful). But on the contrary, Walls respects her parents' knack for making hardships feel like adventures, and her love for them--despite their overwhelming self-absorption--resonates from cover to cover. --Brangien Davis
Product Description
The Glass Castle is a remarkable memoir of resilience and redemption, and a revelatory look into a family at once deeply dysfunctional and uniquely vibrant. When sober, Jeannette's brilliant and charismatic father captured his children's imagination, teaching them physics, geology, and how to embrace life fearlessly. But when he drank, he was dishonest and destructive. Her mother was a free spirit who abhorred the idea of domesticity and didn't want the responsibility of raising a family. The Walls children learned to take care of themselves. They fed, clothed, and protected one another, and eventually found their way to New York. Their parents followed them, choosing to be homeless even as their children prospered. The Glass Castle is truly astonishing -- a memoir permeated by the intense love of a peculiar, but loyal, family. Jeannette Walls has a story to tell, and tells it brilliantly, without an ounce of self-pity.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1155 more reviews...
 Excellent book on overcoming hardships January 7, 2009
Karen Tribett
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Excellent example how we can overcome th worst of circumstances and still have a very successful life.
Wonderful book January 6, 2009
Elizabeth Murray
I am not a reader and i couldn't put this book down! It is so fun to read. I actually read the book first then bough this copy to pass around to friends. I haven't had a bad review yet! It is easy to read and very interesting that it is actually a true story.
Could not put it down! January 6, 2009
S. Ahmed (sandimas, CA United States)
It is hard for me to finish a book. I am always giving up half way. Not with The Glass Castle. I read it in 2 nights staying up until 4am. Great read...
 What if this had been your life? January 6, 2009
Rebecca N. Phillips
The story in this book was very believable untill the end - this is the part that really made me question what I had been thinking to this point. I think the ending is what made the book mean more and has kept me talking about the book.
Magical memories January 5, 2009
E. C. Buddenhagen (Denver, CO)
The author is able to write about, and remember her youth with grace. The Glass Castle never came to be, but her parents did give her the ability to dream.
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