The Glass Castle is a memoir about the tumultuous and nomadic upbringing of journalist and best-selling author, Jeannette Walls. In the beginning, the traveling gang’s rootlessness is whimsical and exciting, an adventure to find gold and build the titular “glass castle” in the hot dessert of the Midwest.

Walls’ father, Rex, is brilliant and well-versed in science, mathematics, astronomy and many other subjects despite only holding a high school diploma. He captures the imagination and hearts of his children through the tall-tales of his own life and time serving in the Air Force. Their mother, Rosemary, is a free-spirited and troubled artist who is an “adventure addict”, loving nothing more than to paint and read for days on end. It seems an idyllic life.

However, as time marches on, Rex’s drinking tightens its grip on him and the already fragile family begins to fall apart. Rosemary, dealing with her own complex issues, takes on different teaching posts without holding onto any one of them for long and sometimes refusing to work despite her children’s hunger. Through their starvation, poverty, and neglect, the Walls children stick together, taking care of each other, working and saving money to make their escape to New York.

Every member of the eccentric family is written with care, compassion and a distinct voice that allows you to empathize and understand each character beyond just being “bad” or “good”. Walls’ flexes her story-telling muscles with evocative descriptions that transport you first to Arizona, then Las Vegas, San Francisco and other places the family lived. Although the book does not have chapters, it is well structured with short sections, giving you a window into their daily lives. The pace is excellent, speeding and slowing along with the turbulent family and moving on from one thing to another as fast as they “skedaddled” from one town to the next.

What separates The Glass Castle from other autobiographical stories of nomadic poverty-stricken families, is not just the mental illness, neglect, and selfishness the children endured from their parents, but their ability to forgive and create a better life for themselves, even without the help of the people who were supposed to take care of them.