The Glass Castle: A Memoir
Dec 2006 · Simon and Schuster
4.6star
928 reviewsreport
Ebook
304
Pages
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About this ebook
THE BELOVED #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER—FROM THE AUTHOR OF HANG THE MOON
The extraordinary, one-of-a-kind, “nothing short of spectacular” (Entertainment Weekly) memoir from one of the world’s most gifted storytellers.
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.
The memoir was also made into a major motion picture from Lionsgate in 2017 starring Brie Larson, Woody Harrelson, and Naomi Watts.
The extraordinary, one-of-a-kind, “nothing short of spectacular” (Entertainment Weekly) memoir from one of the world’s most gifted storytellers.
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.
The memoir was also made into a major motion picture from Lionsgate in 2017 starring Brie Larson, Woody Harrelson, and Naomi Watts.
Ratings and reviews
4.6
928 reviews
Lauren Berry
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July 30, 2025
Well she put into words what I couldn't. Not the same but extremely similar. I read it as a kid in a mental hospital. Couldn't explain things to my husband so I am having him read the book. Also shes not a hero its circumstance. She made the best of what she could. Also at the time of writing her siblings were all alive and they have to sign off on the book. I don't think shes overshadowing that she likely hates her parents but her mother was still alive when this book was published. She had to get everyone in her family to sign off on it and she had to change it to avoid defamation suits. Its not unbelievable, most people never see this side of life and the people that do dont write about it. Maybe listen to real people more and not just best sellers. Have empathy not just for the writer and her written feelings.
A Google user
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March 4, 2009
This tragic tale evidences more than simple idiosyncratic behavior on the part of this author's parents. There are tales of frank child abuse, leaving children on their own, children hungry, children setting themselves on fire trying to cook a meal at age four. The list goes on and on. Perhaps this memoir proved cathartic for the author. It is a well written, well crafted view into the life of children truly fallen down through the looking glass.
Erik G.
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September 5, 2019
Meh. It's a memiore so I expect accuracy. But it opens up with her enjoying Persian rugs, pearls, and Vivaldi? Who are you, Danielle Steel? I think it's meant to give a moral on accepting other's different forms of happiness in life, but it never gets there. Just a kid growing up in basically a gypsy home. Move, trouble, move, trouble, move, go to school, change ways, be successful. Add an alcoholic father and free spirit mother and thats the book. The glass castle is only minimally relevant even with the symbolism it's meant to provide (promises not delivered). I don't recommend this book because it doesn't give the reader anything but something to read in the bathroom. That being said, the shampoo ingredients offer more use in life.
8 people found this review helpful
About the author
Jeannette Walls graduated from Barnard College and was a journalist in New York. Her memoir, The Glass Castle, has been a New York Times bestseller for more than eight years. She is also the author of the instant New York Times bestsellers The Silver Star and Half Broke Horses, which was named one of the ten best books of 2009 by the editors of The New York Times Book Review. Walls lives in rural Virginia with her husband, the writer John Taylor.
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