The Glass Castle
Jeannette’s parents felt free to have four children, but their obligations seemed to end there. The father was lucky to last for more than a month on a new job. He could always find reasons to quit or get fired. "You’ll never make a fortune working for the boss man," he explained. This meant moving his family to another more promising town. Often they would leave their apartment in the middle of the night to escape paying a week’s rent.
The mother never objected to their constant moving, so long as she could bring her art supplies with her. She didn’t like being employed, either. She always could be "nonchalant in the face of adversity."
This meant the four young children had to take care of themselves, and finally their parents. Jeannette, the narrator of the memoir, had an older sister, a younger brother, and a baby sister. The one thing the parents provided for their kids was reading material. So Jeannette and her siblings wer usually ahead in the different schools they attended. But the fact that they stuck to the same clothes, seldom had baths, never had lunches, created their social enigma.
The antagonist of the family was certainly the father. He thrilled his children with plans for the future and even draws blueprints for the glass castle he promises to build. But these plans were always postponed by his search for alcohol and where he'd find the money to buy it. Jeannette thought he seemed "hell-bent on destroying himself....and he was going to pull us all down with him."
So the children, one by one, escaped to New York City and did well there. Their biggest problem was that their parents followed them, both of whom eventually joined the homeless, street crowd.
Jeannette Wall tells a fascinating story about living in a very dysfunctional home. Probably thousands of young people across the country have reason, but little inspiration, to tell the same story. Jeannette Wall wrote it for herself, and them.
The Glass Castle was published in 2005.