Jeannette Walls's memoir The Glass Castle was "nothing short of spectacular" ( Entertainment Weekly ). Now, in Half Broke Horses , she brings us the story of her grandmother, told in a first-person voice that is authentic, irresistible, and triumphant. "Those old cows knew trouble was coming before we did." So begins the story of Lily Casey Smith, Jeannette Walls's no nonsense, resourceful, and spectacularly compelling grandmother. By age six, Lily was helping her father break horses. At fifteen, she left home to teach in a frontier town -- riding five hundred miles on her pony, alone, to get to her job. She learned to drive a car ("I loved cars even more than I loved horses. They didn't need to be fed if they weren't working, and they didn't leave big piles of manure all over the place") and fly a plane. And, with her husband Jim, she ran a vast ranch in Arizona. She raised two children, one of whom is Jeannette's memorable mother, Rosemary Smith Walls, unforgettably portrayed in The Glass Castle . Lily survived tornadoes, droughts, floods, the Great Depression, and the most heartbreaking personal tragedy. She bristled at prejudice of all kinds -- against women, Native Americans, and anyone else who didn't fit the mold. Rosemary Smith Walls always told Jeannette that she was like her grandmother, and in this true-life novel, Jeannette Walls channels that kindred spirit. Half Broke Horses is Laura Ingalls Wilder for adults, as riveting and dramatic as Isak Dinesen's Out of Africa or Beryl Markham's West with the Night . Destined to become a classic, it will transfix audiences everywhere.

珍妮特•沃爾斯（Jeannette Walls），美國著名記者，撰有《閑聊：流言世界的內幕》、《閑聊：流言如何變成新聞，新聞怎樣成為另一場秀》等書。二○○五年齣版迴憶錄《玻璃城堡》，首次公開自己鮮為人知、與眾不同的傢庭背景和成長經曆，從而蜚聲文壇。派拉濛公司買下瞭此書的電影版權，因《飢餓遊戲》在好萊塢大火特火的女星詹妮弗-勞倫斯將擔綱主演，和李安閤作《少年Pi的奇幻漂流》的製片人吉爾-奈特擔當電影製片人。 目前此書已經銷售齣三十二國版權。二○○九年珍妮特•沃爾斯再度推齣新作《半馴之馬》（Half Broke Horses），被《紐約時報》評為二○○九年十大好書。這兩部作品至今依然高踞各大暢銷書排行榜。就在今年7月份，《紐約時報》非虛構類暢銷書周榜上，《玻璃城堡》仍名列第7位，距其齣版時間已經8年瞭。