Just read this book on my mother's recommendation and thought would ask if anyone else has read it.
I thought it was amazing. I felt a real mixture of emotions reading it, particularly anger at the irresponsibility of the parents and also weirdly uplifted by the strength of the relationship between the siblings. Very interesting take on voluntary homelessness/mavericks living out of the "system".
Basically, biography of JW who as a child lived in extreme poverty in Phoenix, California, Nevada and then Welch, West Virginia. Very feckless parents - ne-er do well alcoholic father and rather detached mother. All three older children very clever and very self-sfficient from an early age.
Starts with Wells on the way to a party in NYC when she looks out of the cab window and sees her mother rooting through a dumpster.