Helpful Score: 8
This book is spell binding. It really brought to life a different time. The writer's grandmother, when she was 15, rode pony for three weeks across New Mexico and Arizona to take a job teaching.
Besides being a good book, this book solved an interesting problem for me. When my 90 year old mother was in the hospital, and we weren't sure that she was going to make it, I read her this book. Sometimes people want company, but we all run out of things to say. And as memory starts to slip we were doing the same topics over and over. So....
I started reading her this book. Everyone loved it. Even my Dad. Soon they were both talking about how the book reminded them of this and that. How things were similar for them and how they were different. At one point, my whole family was there, including my kids, and we had the room pretty full.
When I had to travel back home, Dad took over the reading, because they both wanted to see how it ends.
Linda O.
Besides being a good book, this book solved an interesting problem for me. When my 90 year old mother was in the hospital, and we weren't sure that she was going to make it, I read her this book. Sometimes people want company, but we all run out of things to say. And as memory starts to slip we were doing the same topics over and over. So....
I started reading her this book. Everyone loved it. Even my Dad. Soon they were both talking about how the book reminded them of this and that. How things were similar for them and how they were different. At one point, my whole family was there, including my kids, and we had the room pretty full.
When I had to travel back home, Dad took over the reading, because they both wanted to see how it ends.
Linda O.
Helpful Score: 4
This is an entertaining, easy ready about the author's grandmother who had quite an interesting life. The story is told in the first-person voice of her grandmother, Lily, so the author embellished where she needed to. It read like stories recounted, not like a cohesive novel. If you havent read The Glass Castle, read this first it would add to the story.
Helpful Score: 2
A great read about a feisty and resourceful woman. The characters were rich with wit and wisdom, and it was both painful and delightful to follow her life's journey. I would have loved the story to expand more into the final years of her life, but it was a worthwhile read.
Helpful Score: 2
I loved The Glass Castle, marveling at how such a disfunctional childhood could also be loving and funny. I also loved Half Broke Horses. It fills in some of the blanks on how this family's eccentricities came about. It also paints a wonderful picture of hard-scrabble life in the dry desert west. I highly recommend this book!
Helpful Score: 2
Really enjoyed Jeannette Walls look back to her Grandmother's life. And the hints of what was to come from her mother and father in "Glass Castles". Although technically a novel, you get the feel for real experiences and thoughts - as though Ms Walls found some secret way to tap into her Grandmother's past. Definitely recommended, especially if you have already read - or plan to read - Glass Castles.
