Jeannette Walls - The Glass Castle

I received this book several months ago as part of a present. For some reason the back cover information just didn't generate any interest to make me start reading. The Glass Castle sat in a basket collecting dust for a long time... and then I ran out of books to read. I picked it up again and scanned the back. This time I noticed the author's name and picture. Jeannette Walls? Why did that sound so familiar? I recognized her face from TV too. Being the shallow creature that I am, the story seemed far more interesting now that it was about the life of a television personality. So I grabbed the book and brought it with me to the beach.

The Premise
The Walls family consists of Rex, Rose Mary, Lori, Jeannette, Brian, and Maureen. Rex is the patriarch of the family and an intelligent, well-spoken man with big dreams. He teaches his children survival skills, astronomy, and history, with a bit of physics thrown in for good measure. He has drawn up plans to build a home for the family made entirely out of glass: "The Glass Castle". The trouble is that Rex is a raging alcoholic and can't manage to hold down a job or provide any income for his family. His children sleep in boxes on the floor, wear dirty and stained threadbare clothing, and frequently go through the day without any food, let alone balanced meals. Because he can't pay his bills, the family frequently "does the skedaddle" in the middle of the night—they fill up the car with what they can and disappear into the night, moving on to the next town. Rose Mary is trained to be a teacher but chooses not to work so that she can focus on her artwork. She seems to have some kind of attention deficit disorder and has many projects in the planning stage but rarely accomplishes whatever it is she plans to do. While her children are starving, filthy, and sleeping under inflatable rafts to keep out the rain from a hole in the roof, she seems content to sit back, occasionally paint and allow her husband to squander their few dollars on booze.

The Walls children are true survivors. They not only manage to live in desperate conditions, they almost thrive in them. They do well in school, they stand up for themselves and what they believe in, they earn extra money, and, generally, do the very best they can considering that they are pretty much on their own and raising themselves. No food? They dig through garbage cans in the cafeteria at school. Holes in their pants? They color their legs with black marker to make them less noticeable. Kids throwing rocks at them? They build a mattress-catapult to fling dozens of rocks back. While Rex and Rose Mary continue to do absolutely nothing to improve their family situation (and you'd be amazed at some of the opportunities that come along), their children, one by one, decide that they are going to break free from the disaster that is their life.

My Impression
Once I started reading The Glass Castle, I could not put it down. The writing is simple and clear and, as a result, I finished the book within 2 days. It was fascinating to me to read how Rex transformed every moment of crisis into an adventure that the children usually enjoyed. Every setback and deprivation was, to Rose Mary's mind, an opportunity to improve oneself. I had to wonder if the author's parents were in denial or just slightly insane. Throughout the book, the children's strength is just extraordinary. They roll with the figurative and literal punches and manage to survive with their spirits intact. The last few chapters of the book are incredible—the life that Rex and Rose Mary Walls choose to live after their children move out on their own is astonishing.

The only criticism of the book that I have is the incredible detail with which the author supposedly remembers about each part of her life, beginning at the age of three. I, personally, have very little recollection about that part of my life and certainly not enough to narrate a six-week period of my life as she does. Occasionally I found that my delight in the story was compromised by my curiosity about how much of it was embellished or simply just fiction. Those moments were few and far between, however, because I usually was too engrossed into the story to do anything other than enjoy it.

Overall Recommendation
The Glass Castle is a compelling story about growing up in the very worst of circumstances. Though you are reading about living without electricity, running water, regular meals and so on, the book is interesting and detailed without becoming depressing. I would rank this as probably one of the top 5 books that I have read in a very long time.