What readers think of The Glass Castle, plus links to write your own review.

WOW!!! I am Helen and I am nine years old. My mom read that book and said it was wonderful...so I picked it up and read a few pages and could not put it down!! It was wonderful!! It was like a foggy window. Each little piece you understand clears some of it out. I'm sure your life when you were a little kid was a wild, crazy, exciting and fun adventure!!

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Although we, the readers, were able to see that the parents were actually abusing their children, we were also shown many instances that proved that they did, indeed, love the children, as well. So many times, authors who write this type of biographical book make the parents out to be absolute horrors , Although I certainly felt sympathy for the children, the author managed to show that the parents were also worthy of our sympathy. It it was interesting that all of the children seemed to turn into well adjusted adults with the exception of Maureen. This was odd to me because, of all the children, Maureen was the one who spent the least amount of time actually with the family, Since she spent so much time in 'normal' households, I thought it was interesting that she was the one who seemed to have the most problems as an adult.. Since most of these children did turn into well-adjusted adults, were the parents really so awful?

This book is so good honestly I wasn't sure if I wanted to read (a teacher offered extra credit to write a review) but once I started (I used a friends copy) and once I started reading I REALLY LIKED IT!! This book is like a less intense version of A Child Called It

i am only in the middle of the book but what i read so far is amazing i like the content and how they have to move from town to town.

An absolutely engaging book. It portrays the ease of children and their ability to adapt to parents as immature and unrealistic as themselves. It tells of the hope and steel that children find in small and large situations and how they grow adversity into dreams. It is a journey from the ideals of childhood to the reality of adulthood. Memorable.

I just finished reading this wonderful book and cannot get over how the children ended up with the will to go on. There are people in this world that like to dwell on their past and then there were the Walls children. What a gift they have given to those of us with not so happy childhoods. If they can do it, why can't we? Hopefully, I can learn by her. Sometimes we can't forget, but we can go on.

There's no denying that the Walls family saga is one of the most disturbing stories of neglect and child abuse. But what is so odd about this story and yet so refreshing is that the greatest element that sheds light into this potentially hopeless situation is that there is a familial love that comes through. Not so if you equate love with physical care but love if you equate it with an internal guage that binds people who could and should have become completely dysfunctional in every way. That can be the only explanation of how three of these children escaped the torment of a lifelong stigma of disorders that would have been the result of such a bleak childhood. While, the youngest found others to meet her needs as a child by escaping into the care of others, it proved to be just that...escape. As an adult, she lacked the tools and grit to live through misery and emerge with the clarity of a sad situation. One in which there is always a choice--to make things better as her older sisters and brother were able to do and not get lost in the misery of the past. Anyone who thinks their childhood was hard could find hope and courage just reading this book and re-examing their own life to find the tools to move along in recovery.

I recently read the book The Glass Castle in our book club,
I loved the book, I couldn't put it down, I found it totally
believeble; however, one of the girls in the club did not-
her problem with reading the book was that she thought
that Jeannete didn't show a lot of emotion in a lot of
different difficult circumstances- that it was written like
a documentary, she just stated the facts, but with little
emotion. --example, when Jeannette wrote about her lack
of food, my friend seemed to feel because Jeannette didn't
state HOW hungry she was ( I was starving, my stomach
was growling, I don't know how I'm going to get through
the day, I feel sick etc.) that it somehow wasn't quite
believable. Most people in Jeannetee's circumstances would
express how the situation made them feel, instead, in most
cases she just stated what happened.
We also saw Jeannette's interview on Tv on the show
"The View" Jeannette also showed a lack of emotion then
as well.
Did anyone else feel the same way as my friend felt,
do you have an opinion as to why Jeannette wrote it that
way?
Would appreciate your comments.

B. Gee