[Miss Ferber] believes in beauty—a belief which is all right so long as you don't talk about it at all, or do talk about it with the felicity of genius: the talk about it in 'So Big' is unfortunately tinged with sentimentality. Still, the story is energetic and in places almost thrilling. It tells of a woman who sets herself to fight the sardonic powers of nature, and wring from her own ignorance and the capricious soil a livelihood for herself and a chance of living for her son. The son turns out to be nothing better than a success. He does not create beauty; he just successfully sells bonds…. Dirk, handsome, athletic, popular, is a dreadful disappointment to his mother. This raises a number of questions, to which life returns the implacable and impartial answer of fact…. The old cheap lie that the good man becomes...