Synopses & Reviews
In this unconventional memoir, Kevin Holdsworth vividly portrays life in remote, unpredictable country and ruminates on the guts - or foolishness - it takes to put down roots and raise a family in a merciless environment.
Growing up in Utah, Holdsworth couldn't wait to move away. Once ensconced on the East Coast, however, he found himself writing westerns and dreaming of the mountains he'd skied and climbed. Fed up with city life, he moved to a small Wyoming town.
In Big Wonderful, he writes of a mountaineering companion's death, the difficult birth of his son, and his father's terminal illness - encounters with mortality that sharpened his ideas about risk, care, and commitment. He puts a new spin on mountaineering literature, telling wild tales from his reunion with the mountains but also relating the surprising willpower it took to turn back from risks he would have taken before he became a father. He found he needed courage to protect and engage deeply with his family, his community, and the wild places he loves.
Holdsworth's essays and poems are rich with anecdotes, characters, and vivid images. Readers will feel as if they themselves watched a bear destroy an entire expedition's food, walked with his great-great-grandmother along the icy Mormon Trail, and tried to plant a garden in Wyoming's infamous wind.
Readers who love the outdoors will enjoy this funny and touching take on settling down and adventuring in the West's most isolated country.
Review
"[Big Wonderful] is an artful combination of essays and poetry (mostly essays) on a variety of topics that are usually very personal, very human, and always thought-provoking. There is room for disagreement with the author on some issues, but that just ma
Review
"Holdsworth invites us to sit down at his literary campfire and listen to vivid, unforgettable stories. We look on as he dodges lightning bolts, fishes for brookies, and rescues drowning dogs. He reflects on the death of his close friend, the illness of h
Review
"Holdsworth provides a canny vision of Wyoming and the West, from both sides of the Mormon mirror. What begins with simple observations from a Utah transplant to Wyoming becomes an ode to family and place, and perhaps an elegy for it all."
- Jeffe
Synopsis
In a vivid portrayal of life in the country, a man who moved to a small Wyoming town to get away from the city life shares his experience living in a merciless environment--from a mountaineering companion's death and the difficult birth of his son, to a bear destroying an entire expedition's food--which sharpened his ideas about risk, care, and commitment.
Synopsis
In this unconventional memoir, Kevin Holdsworth vividly portrays life in remote, unpredictable country and ruminates on the guts - or foolishness - it takes to put down roots and raise a family in a merciless environment.
About the Author
Kevin Holdsworth is an associate professor of English and directs the Western American Studies Program at Western Wyoming College in Rock Springs.