Rating: 
Summary: A Thrilling Story of the Pride of an American Family
Review: This book alternately makes you root for the hero, Bo Mason, and against him as he struggles for the American Dream. The Masons' difficulties as they all struggled for their pride and for their family made this book difficult to put down
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Summary: The most boring "work of literature" i have ever read
Review: This book is terrible!!! I was forced to read this book for summer reading and definitley did not enjoy it, dont waste the 14 bucks to buy this piece of junk. I really hated this it is boring!!! Wallace puts too much useless info into the 576 pages of this hunk of crap. The first sentance is about two pages long and he often switches between 3rd and 2nd person, it is really annoying. Dont wate your life reading this book try reading "My name is asher LEv" by Chaim Potok It is truly an inspiring novel unlike this boring book. Wow i hate this book i truly hate it with every square inch of my body! I promise dont waste ur time reading this book
Rating: 
Summary: Looking but never finding
Review: This book was the first (and, so far, only) book by Wallace Stegner that I have read. First, let me say that I did enjoy the writing, stylistically speaking. Stegner has an excellent command of the language and his prose is vivid and richly textured, and that quality alone stands him in the first rank of American writers (and earns this book at least one extra star). Other than his writing, however, I did not enjoy the book. It tells the story of the Masons, a family that is lost, rootless, looking for the next big thing but never really arriving. For the most part, Bo--the father, certainly the book's dominant character, arguably its protagonist--is an awful, practically soulless human being. Not only does he die unredeemed, unrepentant, and ignorant of his own emptiness, he sucks his wife Elsa--the only vaguely sympathetic character in the book--down with him. Her life and death end up being as empty as his. Their children seem like major losers too. I was disappointed that there was not a single character in the book with whom I could identify or sympathize; there was not a cautionary tale, a lesson, or a moral that I could take away from reading it; and there was very little about the book at all, other than the geography, to which I could relate in any significant way. Yet the book resonates with many people, including the friend who recommended it to me. I am curious to understand why other readers like it so much.
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Summary: One Family's Rocky Road To The American Dream
Review: This is a the saga of one man's struggle to obtain the American Dream. Bo Mason, like many men before him, dreamed of travelling to the West to make his fortune. This story, however, is different. Far from being the myth of the lone, brave, heroic rugged individualist, Bo Mason's self-centeredness involves dragging his loyal wife, Elsa, and their two sons from place to place to place in his search for wealth. His family never develop roots nor a sense of belonging. Mason is also blind to the suffering and degradation he causes his family. One of his get rich quick schemes, bootlegging, exposes his family to great danger--both from the law and the lawless. He is also a very complex man: when things go right for him, he is a loving father and husband, and full of fun and jokes; he is a great story teller. When his business fall apart, he is sullen and subjects his sons to abuse. He is ultimately a failure.This is a novel which is rich in character development. You genuinely care for each and character. There is a great sense of time and place. Each scene of the book is well imagined and beautifully "visualized." It is also harrowing, often sad, and ultimately tragic. In the end, as it is in real life, it is up to the younger generation, here, the younger son, Bruce, to achieve, perhaps in a more modest way what the father could not.
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Summary: One of the great books of the American West
Review: Though this book was written in the 30s, it is timeless. The dilemma Else faces with her husband's constant search for the scheme that will make him rich and his subsequent illegal methods of earning a liviing could be faced by any American woman today.
Big Rock Candy Mountain is a must read for any Westerner, or better yet, any American
Rating: 
Summary: An American treasure
Review: Wallace Stegner is an American treasure and one of the great writers of the American west. If you have never treated yourself to one of his books, why wait any longer? If you've read, say, "Angle of Repose" and wonder if his other works measure up, don't worry... they do. In this one, he tells the story of the itinerant Mason family over the course of 30 years, from just after the turn of the century until the early 1930s. You'll follow them from the Dakotas to Saskatchewan to Montana, Nevada, and Utah, as Bo Mason, intent on making it big, involves his family in a variety of get rich quick schemes, (some legal, some not) that emotionally wrench the family from one city to the next. They are always on the brink of either great wealth or abject poverty, of high society or a prison term. Stegner can weave a tale like few other writers. Very highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: An American treasure
Review: Wallace Stegner is an American treasure and one of the great writers of the American west. If you have never treated yourself to one of his books, why wait any longer? If you've read, say, "Angle of Repose" and wonder if his other works measure up, don't worry... they do. In this one, he tells the story of the itinerant Mason family over the course of 30 years, from just after the turn of the century until the early 1930s. You'll follow them from the Dakotas to Saskatchewan to Montana, Nevada, and Utah, as Bo Mason, intent on making it big, involves his family in a variety of get rich quick schemes, (some legal, some not) that emotionally wrench the family from one city to the next. They are always on the brink of either great wealth or abject poverty, of high society or a prison term. Stegner can weave a tale like few other writers. Very highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: The powerful lure and tragedy of the American Dream
Review: Wallace Stegner is different than most famous American writers, eschewing colorful literary activities like drug use, wife-swapping, and gross public displays of antisocial behavior. After a most difficult childhood, which is essentially chronicled in The Big Rock Candy Mountain, he married and stayed married, and received appointments to the faculties of prestigious universities. Yet Stegner's childhood, on the harsh plains of Saskatchewan, in the timber camps of the Northwest, and as the son of a bootlegger, marked Stegner as the survivor of a headlong and foolhardy quest after the American dream. That dream, and the belief that it could easily be found in the Plains and mountains of the North American West is abstracted in the mind of Bo Mason, the literary doppelganger for Stegner's father, as the Big Rock Candy Mountain.
Much of Stegner's work focused on the choices we make in life, and the effect those choices have on our loved ones. In many ways, his urge towards moderation in personal affairs mirrored his burgeoning interest in conservation, and both were born of his childhood, where he saw precious commodities like love and timber misused and wasted.
The Big Rock Candy Mountain captures the drive, much lost in recent years, towards the frontiers of our existence. The frontier myth--and after reading Stegner's work you'll realize it is to a certain extent a myth--is perhaps the single defining attribute of what it means to be American. Stegner realizes this, and he realizes what can happen to our reality when the quest for a dream is taken too far.
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Summary: A bold and raw work by one of America's greatest writers
Review: Wallace Stegner wrote "The Big Rock Candy Mountain" relatively early in his career (1943, at age 34), and the book reflects the author's enormous talents, which were still developing at that time. Stegner tells the tale of Bo Mason, who leads a rootless life on the fringes of the law. Mason is a bootlegger, gambler and precious metals speculator. Each peak he achieves is higher than his last, and each valley is deeper. This is true both financially and in his relationship with his wife, Elsa, and two sons, Chet and Bruce. Some reviewers point out that the story is somewhat autobiographical. That's probably a safe assumption. But it's also the story of the American West a century ago, where raw optimism, the struggle for acceptance, and harsh realities shaped people's existence.
The harsh reality of "The Big Rock Candy Mountain" is that it isn't one of Stegner's best works. Of course, that's a very high standard. Readers will understandably have great expectations when diving into this book, and some may be disappointed. For example, the younger son's seething hatred towards his father is introduced early in the book and is central to the conclusion, but is poorly developed in the interim chapters. Likewise, the voice of the book drifts between the 3rd person and the 2nd person. This gives the reader a voyeuristic glimpse into each character's personal thoughts. It's a nice gimmick, but awkwardly executed.
On an absolute scale, this book is a no-brainer 5 stars. But relative to other Stegner novels, "The Big Rock Candy Mountain" has some minor flaws. Read it and you'll certainly enjoy it. But you'll appreciate even more experiencing the early efforts of one of America's greatest 20th century writers.
Rating:
Summary: Tough and relentless story
Review: When I read that BRCM is 'roughly autobiographical,' I was stunned that a writer of Stegner's magnitude could come from such a pitiless, brutal background. The transient, rootless, poverty-stricken upbringing of the children in the Mason family is rife with tension, resentment, and a level of bleakness that's hard to comprehend. Bo Mason is the most powerful character, by far, a bootlegger always chasing the dream of fast money and instant wealth. It's hard to know exactly how Stegner feels about the character of Bo's wife, a long-suffering, self-sacrificing woman who remains loyal and always seems to be making excuses for him to their children. It's tough reading a story of such an abusive family situation, but it sure reads 'real' in its portrayal of a search for roots, for home, for love, for connection.
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