Wow. I first noticed this book when a stranger sat down next to me a brunch a few months ago with it. She recommended it and I've been looking forward to trying it.This is a memoir about a woman's unusual childhood. Walls grew up as one of four children with two unbelievably creative, irreverent, and irresponsible parents. She moved around a lot as a child, living in intense poverty and often being forced to leave places in the middle of the night due to financial and social obligations her parents didn't fulfil. The family often lives without food, heat, electricity, and other necessities for over a decade.
It is easy for the reader to feel angry towards her parents and the other adults in her life, but Walls does not relate any of that in her writing. She tells her story with compassion and wit - with the eye of an adult but the heart of a child. Her journalistic background (she now writes for MSNBC) shines through as she relates her stories.
I hope Walls decides to share a bit more of her story going forward. I would like to know the details of her life once she grows up which are condensed into a few short chapters at the end of this book. But I am grateful that she decided to share this much - it is a brave book and one that I am happy to have read.
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