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.