Reader's              Journal

During my time reading The Great Castle it has taught me so much about life in such a little period of time.I can honestly say that it is one of my favorites.I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone.A book like this one connects with your life so much that it has you left thinking about what can you do better in your life to improve yourself and the future of your family.It helps you open your eyes on the perspective of life. While reading the book it is like you are living Jeannette's life with her.The Great Castle has made me realize to never take my life for granted.It has also taught me that no matter how hard it keeps getting to get to the peak of the mountain to never give up.The hardships are worth going through because once you get to the top the view is great.One specific thing that this book really touched on was the past and accepting it and instead of keeping it bad make it useful and let it give you motivations for the future.I felt her speaking to me and saying to never be ashamed of your past and to accept the person you are and to tell the truth about yourself because if you keep living a life of lies you will never have the happiness you want because those lies start to make you fear and fear always gets into the way of happiness.By accepting the past you and whatever went wrong or you have done wrong you can always make it up.Now, touching on the subject of a family it makes you realizes how much can happen to a family.The Great Castle teaches you that it can destroy a family and I can honestly say it does because I can absolutely relate to it.Dealing with parents who are always fighting and bickering makes you feel like you are the problem.A family who has an alcoholic makes you feel neglected because it is like they care about the alcohol more than anything else in their life.You start to feel alone and all you want to do is be loved but soon you just get tired of it and want to get out because your stuck in a family where there is barely any love and that is all you want; to not be neglected.That is when you set goals for yourself for when you get older.To make sure your family is happy and to make a difference.