Reporter Jeannette Walls’ memoir on her dysfunctional family, The Glass Castle, is a great pick for book club — filled with complex characters, stunning prose, and snippets of an unconventional childhood many can only imagine. Readers of dark but hopeful memoirs such as Angela’s Ashes, Heart Berries, and Hillbilly Elegy will feel right at home discussing this vagabond family.
Spending more than eight years on the New York Times bestseller list and inspiring a film adaptation starring Brie Larson, The Glass Castle has won over the hearts of millions with the Walls’ painful, moving tale.
Below, we share book club questions to prompt some thoughtful discussion, as well as our favorite quotes, trivia questions, and book recommendations for your next book club.
Table of contents
The Glass Castle summary
The Glass Castle is a remarkable memoir of resilience and redemption, and a revelatory look into a family that’s at once deeply dysfunctional and uniquely vibrant.
When sober, Walls’ 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. Walls’ 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 Glass Castle book club questions
- This book depicts a childhood of high highs and low lows for the Walls family. Going around the room, name a “high” and a “low” for you when you were reading this book.
- The Walls lived in poverty, but in what ways were they rich?
- Rex has no shortage of questionable parenting moments — from putting his children in life-threatening situations to stealing their hard-earned money right out of their piggy banks. What are Rex’s redeeming qualities, and what are his most damning? How does learning that Rex suffered his own abusive childhood impact the way you view him?
- Now let’s talk about Rose Mary Walls. A self-described “excitement addict,” her eccentric, free spirited personality was often at odds with the responsibility needed to parent. Name a scene that granted you some clarity into her psyche.
- The story starts with the author describing an exchange between the author and her mother — who is homeless living in New York. Why do you think the Walls’ chose to be homeless, even when they had other options?
- Discuss the metaphor of a glass castle and what it means to Jeannette and her father. Why is it significant that, just before going to New York, Jeannette tells her father that she doesn't believe he'll ever build it? Why do you think Walls made it the title of this book?
- Describe Jeannette's relationship to her siblings and discuss the role they played in one another's lives.
- The children overcome their upbringing, finding success and happiness later on in life — except for Maureen, who struggled to adjust to adulthood. How did Maureen’s childhood differ from her older siblings, and how do you think that impacted her long-term?
- By the end of the book, Jeannette and her siblings are still in contact with their mother. Were you surprised by this? What emotions or convictions did it bring up for you?
Memorable quotes
- “Things usually work out in the end.”
“What if they don’t?”
“That just means you haven’t come to the end yet.” - “You should never hate anyone, even your worst enemies. Everyone has something good about them. You have to find the redeeming quality and love the person for that.”
- “One time I saw a tiny Joshua tree sapling growing not too far from the old tree. I wanted to dig it up and replant it near our house. I told Mom that I would protect it from the wind and water it every day so that it could grow nice and tall and straight. Mom frowned at me. ‘You’d be destroying what makes it special,’ she said. ‘It's the Joshua tree’s struggle that gives it its beauty.’”
- “Life is a drama full of tragedy and comedy. You should learn to enjoy the comic episodes a little more.”
- “I wanted to let the world know that no one had a perfect life, that even the people who seemed to have it all had their secrets.”
- “He said ‘smooth’ is boring but ‘textured’ was interesting, and the scar meant that I was stronger than whatever had tried to hurt me.”
What to read for your next book club
1. The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris
This beautiful, illuminating tale of hope and courage is based on interviews that were conducted with Holocaust survivor and Auschwitz-Birkenau tattooist Ludwig (Lale) Sokolov — an unforgettable love story in the midst of atrocity.
2. All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood
A beautiful and provocative love story between two unlikely people and the hard-won relationship that elevates them above the Midwestern meth lab backdrop of their lives.
3. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
This classic coming-of-age introduces the now-famous arboreal metaphor for socioeconomic diversity, generational differences, and personal development.
Trivia questions for The Glass Castle
To get things warmed up (or if you’re not ready for book club to end), ask a few of these trivia questions for The Glass Castle, and see who really got into the book.
- Which actress was initially going to star in and produce the Glass Castle movie before Brie Larson ultimately took the lead?
- Between 1993 and 1998 Jeannette Walls wrote a column for Esquire — what type of column was this?
- Who convinced Walls to write her story?
- How many books has Walls written?
- How many weeks did the book spend on the NYT bestseller list (hardcover)?
Answers:
- Jennifer Lawrence
- Gossip column
- Her second husband, John J. Taylor
- Four
- Over 260 weeks
Check out our book club questions for The Dutch House by Ann Patchett to keep the discussion going.
