Life in ‘Glass Castle’ only made Walls stronger

To say that Walls' parents were not Ozzie and Harriet would be putting it mildly. Rex Walls was an alcoholic who felt that a mundane life was too constraining for him, but whose big dreams never seemed to come to fruition. The title of the book refers to a great glass house that he was going to build once he made his fortune. Yet despite his all-too-human flaws, Walls never turns him into a monster, rather seeing him as a man she loved and admired while being profoundly disappointed by him.

Her mother, Rose Mary, is a woman who marches to a different drum. A frustrated artist who was not cut out to be the doting mother of four, she hoarded candy bars while her children starved and wouldn't dream of pulling herself away from her art to take a run-of-the-mill job. Later in life, after her children had left her, she was content to live as a squatter in New York, refusing the help of Walls and her siblings.

As the story progresses and an older Walls sees how the world views her and her family, her rose-colored glasses come off. After years of roaming around the desert Southwest, the family eventually moves to their father's family home in Welch, West Virginia. Unhappy about returning to a place he initially escaped, Rex sinks deeper into alcoholism as her Rose Mary retreats further into her own world. The children, now entering their teen years, suffer physical and sexual abuse at the hand of their paternal grandmother and ostracism from the folk of the town.

Longing for a better life, at just 17, Walls moves to New York to live with her older sister. She worked part-time jobs to support herself before being admitted to Barnard.

A fledgling journalist since her start on her high school paper in West Virginia, Walls took a gopher job at New York Magazine during college. From there she moved to the business section, before heading to USA Today as a news reporter. She was lured back to New York Magazine, however, to take over its gossip column.

“I was a little insulted at first,” Walls said. “I always wanted to be a serious journalist. But I just loved [gossip]. It was such a departure from just taking the news that was fed to you.”

She would go on to do a gossip column for Esquire magazine before leaving to write “Dish,” a book about the hard-scrabble world of gossip. While working on the book, she heard that MSNBC.com was looking for an online gossip columnist and, in 1999, took her talents to the World Wide Web. But although she's written hundreds of columns, telling her own story was different.

“I was in control of what people thought of me, but I had no control over what they thought of my mother,” Walls said. “When I asked my mother, ‘how do I tell people about you’ her answer was ‘tell the truth’. But of course, the truth is never simple.”

Denise Hazlick is MSNBC.com's Lead Entertainment Editor

MORE FROM BOOKS

Beatrix Potter drawing sells for $578,700

Beatrix Potter drawing sells for $578,700 Memoir says Madonna's true love is herself Larry King takes on tough subject: his life Salman Rushdie wins ‘Best of Booker’ award Sedaris' new book more mature, thoughtful Steamy novel stars a thinly veiled Laura Bush Rare copy of Austen's 'Emma' sets auction record Sean Connery to unveil long-awaited memoirs   Add Books headlines to your news reader: