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alfazed's review
5.0
I recommended this book to a friend of mine and decided I really want to re-read it this year.
cymo01's review against another edition
5.0
Stegner's "Angle of Repose" tells the story of Oliver and Susan Ward as they seek life in the old American West. The story is told from the point of view of their grandson, a 20th century historian succumbing to a crippling disease. The grandson uses the marriage, struggles, and hardships of his young grandparents as a lens to examine his own life and failed marriage. This book is probably not for everyone. It is slow moving at times, but always compelling. Stegner uses words to paint a beautiful picture of our western frontier. "Angle of Repose" is easily one of the best books I've read in the last several years. Highly recommended if you like contemporary American fiction.
aklanger_18's review
4.0
Wallace Stegner's writing is beautiful. I was pretty enthralled with the setting, which is the West before it was "civilized." I also found the message of the story, which is about a long and flawed marriage, pretty ambiguous, which is maybe the point. Definitely a classic worth reading!
lulu118tulu's review
5.0
My favorite book of all time. Every time I read it I find more to contemplate and relate to. Maybe it's the whole Madison/New England connection but there is a lot here to think about and the writing is exquisite.
reader22554's review against another edition
3.0
I wanted to like this book. I felt like I *should* like this book. Listening to it on Audible should have made it richer. Instead, I found it rather tedious.
The protagonist is writing the biography of his grandmother, who was an artist and a Western pioneer (not by choice but by following her engineer/prospector husband). The book is about a third the grandmother's letters, a third the protagonist's imagining his grandparents' conversations and lives, and a third his own struggles with age and disability. If you like lots of lush descriptions of landscape, you will enjoy the detailed word pictures of a variety of settings (upstate NY, Colo., California, Mexico....) After all, we are seeing a lot of it through the eyes of an artist, who is also a writer, though she doesn't think of herself as one.
If the book were a third shorter, or if I had lived in the places she describes, I'd have liked it more, I think.
*Listened to this book on Audible. 22 hours.
The protagonist is writing the biography of his grandmother, who was an artist and a Western pioneer (not by choice but by following her engineer/prospector husband). The book is about a third the grandmother's letters, a third the protagonist's imagining his grandparents' conversations and lives, and a third his own struggles with age and disability. If you like lots of lush descriptions of landscape, you will enjoy the detailed word pictures of a variety of settings (upstate NY, Colo., California, Mexico....) After all, we are seeing a lot of it through the eyes of an artist, who is also a writer, though she doesn't think of herself as one.
If the book were a third shorter, or if I had lived in the places she describes, I'd have liked it more, I think.
*Listened to this book on Audible. 22 hours.
campgirl's review against another edition
5.0
Definite thought provoker. Or at least it was for me, as I primarily set out to read this based on a reccommendation. Even now, a few days later, I continue to contemplate the different storylines, how they fit together, and how each independent life varied...and how each person's choice is your very own, but that does not mean it does not affect others.
everydayreading's review
4.0
Beautiful and tragic. Seriously, this makes Gone with the Wind look like a happily ever after fairy tale. Took me a bit to get into this book, but I didn't want it to be over by the end.