The Glass Castle
2005 · Jeannette Walls · 288 pages · Non-Fiction
Jeannette Walls' memoir about growing up with brilliant, charismatic, deeply irresponsible parents is a story that shouldn't work as well as it does. The childhood sections, where hunger and danger are filtered through a child's sense of adventure, are some of the most vivid memoir writing in recent decades. Walls manages to love her parents on the page without excusing them, and that balance gives the book its distinctive emotional texture. The adult chapters are less remarkable, and some readers wish the book engaged more directly with the anger buried beneath its forgiving surface. But as a portrait of a family that is simultaneously magical and negligent, it's a book that earns its massive readership.