Description: The Stampers, a logging family pit by circumstance against big business, are rough, hard men and women who live by the motto "never give an inch." Added to the turmoil is the return of Leland, a dope-smoking, college-educated half-brother whose arrival triggers a tidal wave of events that spiral gradually out of control.
Review Quotes: "As in Cuckoo's Nest, Kesey brings to life people you will never forget . . . Getting into this book is getting into a fascinating, crazy world of a fascinating, crazy family which has a throbbing reality and a desperate dedication to living . . . and then there is that great gift for comedy, for purely sensational writing. When Kesey describes the Canada honkers flying over the woods you can almost see them; when he describes the smells of the grass and the tastes of the strawberries you feel and you smell and you taste."
--Ralph J. Gleason, San Francisco Chronicle
--The New York Times Book Review "A tremendous achievement . . . Set against the damp and brutal background of an Oregon logging community, the book by turns gasps, pants, whoops, and shrieks . . . you cannot help but admire Kesey's vigor, his profligate command of the language. And you have to stand back in awe of the man's ability to create character."
--The Cleveland Plain Dealer