Book Review--The Glass Castle

I came across this book through various people. The first time I read it, it was given to me by a friend, who had been given it to her by her mother-in-law who had received it from someone else, etc. It was later selected as a book for my monthly book club. I point this out because this is one of those books that you can't keep quiet about. There are just too many important elements in this book to not want to share with others.

The opening is so compelling. A daughter, in New York, on her way to a very important social function sees her mother digging around in a dumpster. It is so outrageous that I thought, maybe this is book of fiction, not non-fiction. The whole story read that way to me. I kept thinking, "This can't be real. People don't live lives like this and then go on to be successful enough to write about it." It made me realize how closed my world really is. Even when I look back at things I have done in my life of 35 years--lived abroad several times, served an LDS mission, was raised in a very liberal town as a very strong conservative, I often think of my life as very exposed and open. After reading this and other such novels, I realized how wrong I am. And, how I better be a success in life considering the normalcy I have been given. There are so many out there with no consistency who make amazing lives out of what they have been given. This book is one of the best lessons about that very subject.