"I received this book as a gift in June of 2001, on graduation day, from my favorite undergrad literature professor. It was accompanied by a very sweet, heart felt note, thanking me for my contributions to the intellectual life of a person who was - and still is - much smarter, wiser, and more humane than me. The card is signed, "Your friend, Paul (Formally Dr. Eisenstein)."

It's the kind of note that means nothing to a kid graduating college. Which is also the kind of note that can mean a lot more twenty-some years later.

I've carried that card, tucked in this book, but had never read the novel. Which, it turns out was probably a good thing. Dr. Eisenstein - Paul, if I may - why give this book* to a twenty year old kid?

There are parts of this novel that worked for me, but there are large swaths of it that did not. From the vantage point of a kid that did NOT pursue the ivory towers that house the life of the mind, there are parts of this that ring hollow. Parts, even, that seem damn pretentious. I get annoyed when quotations in Italian or Latin aren't translated; not because I can't read them (that's like 50/50) but because I think it's elitist as hell. Couple that with some seriously outdated gender roles (and LOTS of pregnant drinking), and there are some tiresome bits that accompany the life of these minds that are hard to stomach.

Also buried in here, however, is a well structured, moving story about the long term friendship of two couples. Four people who, thanks to Stegner's vivid and thoughtful writing, the reader gets to know pretty well (for better and worse). And in that story are two people who will do anything they can to nurture, support, and offer succor to two other people who don't even know how much they need what's being offered. Basically, it's a well structured book and there's not a lot that doesn't flow into it's larger narrative. Good on you, Mr. Stegner.

And I never want to speak for others, but I think, Paul, that I know why you gave this book to a twenty year old kid. Because you knew - way better than I did - that kid wouldn't always be 20.

Thanks for telling a kid who didn't know any better that you were always willing to be there for them. That if the need arose, you would do whatever you could to nurture, support, and offer succor to me. It's a good thing I didn't read this novel when you gave it to me. I couldn't get it then; now it means the world to me.

Seems like a good time to pay you a visit.** You're back in the same office you were in 2001, and I know exactly how you'll look when you see me knocking on your door. That moment hasn't changed, and I treasure it.


*I've gave him a copy of Michael Chabon's Wonder Boys, or at least recommended it to him. The juxtaposition between that novel and this one might say a lot about our differing mind sets.

**Paul, this seems like as good a time as any to tell you that the only reading I didn't do while at Otterbein was read Dickens' Hard Times when you assigned it to us. I hated Dickens then, one more thing that has drastically changed in the last 20 years. I've read it twice since then and think I'm ready to graduate now."