memoir of a nomadic childhood. 
 parents who gave their children the freedom and latitude to grow, enabled a drive for knowledge, understanding and self sufficiency, and no little love, but failed to provide support, safety, security, boundaries 
 presented in almost fairy tale tones, particularly early on from author's perspective as a young girl and her relationship with her father. 
 gradual realisation of the harsh realities of growing up with day dreaming alcoholic father and a mother seemingly most interested in her art than her family. 
 in some instances, whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger, but not always 
 When he'd had his fill of cussing and hollering and smashing things up, he'd collapse. But Dad drank hard liquor only when we had money, which wasn't often, so life was mostly good in those days 
 Dad had become interested in chaos theory and was reading Los Alamos Science and the Journal of Statistical Physics. He said it had already helped his pool game