Lyman uses his researches to do nothing less than reframe his life perspectives, and try to decide whether he can reconcile himself to accepting the return of his unfaithful wife. This raise the novel above the level of being just a fine chronicle of the tough living conditions in mid 19 th century pioneering mine sites.
It also forms a fascinating nexus between the narrator’s circumstances and the results of his historical researches. It represents the compromises necessary for the survival of both the mining pioneers and the incapacitated, aged narrator Lyman Ward. The title ‘Angle of Repose’ is a powerful metaphor. That’s where the meaning will be if I find any.’ What really interests me is how two such unlike particles clung together, and under what strains, rolling downhill into their future, until they reached the angle of repose where I knew them. A book to be savored.‘What interests me in all these papers is not Susan Burling Ward, the novelist and illustrator, and not Oliver Ward the engineer, and not the west they spend their lives in. If you write, or just appreciate an author who can use words to paint a picture while having you hang on each one.
I think it would have been great to read this book with others for that reason. which some readers may enjoy (I did), but some may not. So, in the end, I felt the reader was left to draw some of their own conclusions. Just a forewarning, the book is not totally satisfying in the sense that Stegner never spoon feeds the reader. The relationship is fraught with both deep, deep love and tension, and the slow build of the book works in favor of the reader's ultimate understanding of how one decision can pivot a life. His grandfather was an engineer trying to make his way in the West. His grandmother was a well bred northeasterner, a person steeped in arts and culture.
The story is about a wheelchair bound writer who is researching and relating the story of his grandparents' relationship. But if you love literary fiction, then YES, this one should be on your list. I think plenty of people would find it hard to finish. However, it is slow moving, and I had to deduct a star for that. I could absolutely re-read this and never tire of it in the same way you can look at the Mona Lisa and never tire of it. It's as though each sentence was crafted with more love than the next. Make no mistake, the actually writing in this book is five stars all the way.
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