Rakestraw Books presents An Evening with Jeannette Walls October 21, 2009

Rakestraw Books “The Bookstore in Danville” is delighted to announce “An Evening with Jeannette Walls.” This special event will take place on Wednesday, 21 October 2009 at the Diablo Country Club. Proceeds from the evening will benefit Wardrobe for Opportunity.

The evening’s guest of honor, author and journalist, Jeannette Walls will be talking about her new book, Half-Broke Horses: A True-Life Novel (Scribner, $26), one of the season’s most anticipated novels. Jeannette Walls was born in Phoenix, Arizona, and grew up in the southwest and Welch, West Virginia. She graduated from Barnard College and was a journalist in New York City for twenty years. Her previous book was the memoir The Glass Castle. She is married to writer John Taylor and lives in Virginia.

During “An Evening with Jeannette Walls,” Walls will talk about her new book, take questions from the audience, and sign books for attendees. The evening’s festivities will include the debut of a short film documentary film of local people talking about their grandmothers. If you would like to take part in this special project, please get in touch with us as soon as possible. Rakestraw Books is also putting together a fabulous raffle to further benefit Wardrobe for Opportunity.

Jeannette Walls's The Glass Castle was "nothing short of spectacular" (Entertainment Weekly). Now she brings us the story of her grandmother -- told in a voice so authentic and compelling that the book is destined to become an instant classic.

"Those old cows knew trouble was coming before we did." So begins the story of Lily Casey Smith, in Jeannette Walls's magnificent, true-life novel based on her no-nonsense, resourceful, hard working, 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, all 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, 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. 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. It will transfix readers everywhere.

“An Evening with Jeannette Walls” is sure to be one of the social events of the season –books, storytelling, and a worthy cause.
For more information or to purchase tickets, please call Rakestraw Books at (925) 837-7337.

Official Website: http://www.rakestrawbooks.com/walls.htm