Okay, so I decided to stick with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and it has started to become interesting. There is a story line being created and it has given me an interest to keep reading. The main character meets with a well to do retired businessman about the death of a niece that happened along time ago that was never solved. The businessman is wanting the journalist to research and try to solve the mystery surrounding the disappearance of his niece. The back story was told this week in my reading. The journalist agrees to the proposal. This book is very long and it has taken awhile to build my interest but it is getting better! Jenny Jones

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is not an easy going read. This week as I was reading I felt like I was just reading and not comprehending where the story is going. I have read to page 70 and still am not engaged with the book. The story line is very boring and I cannot get into the character development. I keep hearing that it gets good but I am not sure I can read anymore! I have decided to switch books to Life of Pi and will start reading tonight.

I began reading  The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. I as began to read I got really bored and it was not engaging at all. A friend told me to keep reading because it does get better and it is a great book. I continued to read and it started to finally get more interesting. The story was very confusing and scattered at the beginnig and now it is setting up main characters and their relationship. I have to say that it is not my favorite read at all plus it is 600 plus pages!! Hopefully by next week I will be more drawn in to the story.

Well, I finished the Glass Castle this week. It was a very sad story about the childhood of Jeannette Walls. The story then moved to her young adult life with her siblings getting out of the Appalachians and starting fresh in New York City. Their parents then pick up and move to NYC too. It details the struggles the siblings have with their relationship with their parents. Their parents choose to be homeless, poor and her father an alcoholic. They are torn but realize that they cannot change who their parents are and they take them for who they are. In the end the family drifts furthers away from each other and their father dies. The story ends at Jeannette's home for Thanksgiving, the first they have celebrated as a family for a long time.
It was a great story and good to see that children growing up in sad situations can thrive and break teh cycle and be successful adults.  The kids wanted to get out of tehir home situation so bad that they madeosome big decisions that would be scary to make, such as moving to a big city such as New York with no money and no plan. We can not choose our parents or change them and we can decide to make the best of it and the children did. There was no doubt their parents loved them but their parents did not know how to be parents.
I would recommend this book to anyone. It is an easy read and very heart wrenching too. It makes you ponder your own childhood and experiences growing up. Thankfully, I had incredible parents!
Since I am finished I will begin to read "Life of Pi".

Glass castle week 6

The Glass Castle continues this week with the story of the main character and her siblings living life as poor, outcast children with their unreliable and unfit parents. Some situations this week saddened me while reading and continue to be in shock with what I read. The childrens mom does get a teaching job again and admittely hates it. Sometimes the kids have to drag her out of bed to go to work. Their mom lvoes them but has no work ethic and is irresponsible. While this is going on their Dad disappears for days and they know that he i son adrinking binge and always find him at the local bar.
Their mom goes away for  a training for two weeks and she leaves a certain amount for the kids. Jeannette the main character is more responsible and budgets for food and other things for her and her siblings for the time their mom is gone. She also is babysitting and earns money for caring for siblings.  Their Dad comes home and the only reason he does come home is to search out more money for drinking and gambling. He then manipulates Jeannette and takes most of the money. She cannot say no to her dad. It is very heartbreaking and I cannot believe that does this. Alcoholism is a serious disease and their dad has no conscience.
One scene in the book this week, the dad takes Jeannette to the bar to try to win money. He then lets a grown man flirt with her and take her up to his apartment. She feels pressured by her Dad to go up with the guy since dad won lots of money from him. The man tries to take advantage of her and she leaves the apartment unharmed. She tells her dad what happened and he shrugs it off and says that he knew she would take care of herself.  The book sadly is reality for many children today and I cannot imagine living life so out of control as a parent.
I read three nights in a row and it is hard not to keep reading. I am getting closer to the finish and want to know how the books ends!!

The Glass Castle

I read Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week for a total of 1 hour and 30 minutes. The Glass Castle keeps getting more intense as I read. Jeannette and her siblings lives get more sad and chaotic as the story fo her childhood goes on. They had finally settled in Phoenix, in her grandma's home and things were great. They had running water, food, lots of room, a bed, clean clothes and they were happy. The author describes Phoenix and the orange trees outside in their yard as being so refreshing. Jeannette was happy and content with her life. Then her parents make them leave all of  their belongings and go across country to West Virginia. The trip took over two months and their car broke down and once again they had to leave whatever possessions they had.
The family arrives to their dads mom's home and it is a disaster. She is abusive towards the kids and they don't eat or shower and she confines them to the basement. Their parents never stick up for them.
Reading all of these sad experiences makes my heart hurt for children that go through life like this daily. The parents could prevent all of the chaos and abuse and neglect but they choose not to due to their own selfish reasons. Their mom has a teaching degree and could be providing for the family and get them running water, electricity, a warm fresh meal but instead they expose them to a horrible environment and make them think of it as an adventure. The parents also say to the kids that it could be worse. I can't imagine their lives being any worse than it already is.  The kids get made fun of at school my other students and the teachers.
The author has done a great job so far with descriptive words and painting the picture of the sad situations the kids experience. The emotional aspect of the book is heartbreaking! I am so curious to see how the book progresses and what happens to the family.

I am thoroughly enjoying the Glass Castle and reading about the main character Jeannette's childhood. The story is so up and down and it makes you feel for the character with everything her parents do or not do. As I am reading her parents do outrageous things but then seem to try to teach them a legitimate lesson with whatever they did dysfunctional and not a normal parent role. This week, while reading the story it dove into her Dad's alcoholism and gambling addiction. The parents played it off so well and made the kids believe that it was for the best and they downplayed it while teh kids knew clearly what was really goig on. Jeannette, the main character and her siblings definitely made a connection that something was not right with their dad but dealt with it and moved on. Their parents fought alot and then their relationship was so up and down. There are many things in the story that have happened that I ask myself, could a parent get away with that now and still have their children in their custody? It then makes you think and realize that there are children that grow up with chaos and learn to adapt and function with the dysfunction. I am so invested in the book it is hard to put down and I find myself wanting to read everynight!! I read Monday through Wednesday about thirty minutes each night.
I am so interested in where the story will go and how Jeannette will turn out as an adult. Stay tuned!!