

In 2009, Walls published her first novel, Half Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel, based on the life of her grandmother Lily Casey Smith. The film adaptation of the same name was released in 2017. On October 9, 2015, it was reported that Lawrence withdrew from the film and she would be replaced by actress Brie Larson. Paramount bought the film rights to the book, and in March 2013 announced that actress Jennifer Lawrence would play Walls in a film adaptation. It received the Christopher Award, the American Library Association's Alex Award (2006), and the Books for Better Living Award. It has sold over 4 million copies and has been translated into 31 languages. The Glass Castle was well received by critics and the public. It offers a look into her life and that of her dysfunctional family. In 2005, Walls published the best-selling memoir The Glass Castle, which details the joys and struggles of her childhood. Her 2000 book, Dish: The Inside Story on the World of Gossip, was a humorous history of the role gossip has played in U.S. Walls has contributed to USA Today, and has appeared on The Today Show, CNN, Primetime, and The Colbert Report. She then wrote a gossip column for Esquire, from 1993 to 1998, then contributed regularly to the gossip column "Scoop" at from 1998 until her departure to write full-time in 2007. From 1987 to 1993 she wrote the "Intelligencer" column for New York magazine. Career Įarly in her career Walls interned at a Brooklyn newspaper called The Phoenix and eventually became a full-time reporter there. Walls graduated from Barnard in 1984 with honors. With the aid of grants, loans, scholarships and a year spent answering phones at a Wall Street law firm, she was able to earn a bachelor's degree in Liberal Arts from Barnard College. Walls moved to New York at age 17 to join her sister Lori (then a waitress, Lori soon became an artist for Archie Comics). When they finally landed in Rex's Appalachian hometown of Welch the family lived in a three-room house without plumbing or heat. Walls' family life was rootless, with the family shuttling from Phoenix to California (including a brief stay in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco), to Battle Mountain, Nevada, and to Welch, West Virginia, with periods of homelessness. Walls has two sisters, Lori and Maureen, and one brother, Brian. Walls was born on April 21, 1960, in Phoenix, Arizona, to Rex Walls and Rose Mary Walls. She is a 2006 recipient of the Alex Awards and Christopher Award. Published in 2005, it had been on the New York Times Best Seller list for 421 weeks as of June 3, 2018. Jeannette Walls (born April 21, 1960) is an American author and journalist widely known as former gossip columnist for and author of The Glass Castle, a memoir of the nomadic family life of her childhood.
