All the Little Live Things is about Wallace Stegner's anger toward the Sixties, their chaotic disinterest in morality and unabashed self-interest. And the book seems also to be about youth: how the idealistic, immediate prejudices of the young can instill in the same man a love of innocence, a hatred of innocent self-righteousness, and a fundamental fear of failure at knowing his own lost child. As with most of Stegner's novels, this is a book about reasons to live; reasons cynical narrator Joe Allston would rather avoid were they not delivered with the promise of a fulfilling and singular friendship. Jun 19, 2007
