---

"A Prayer for Owen Meany"

(Reviewed by Judi Clark FEB 14, 1998)

John Wheelwright is the narrator who tells us about the boy he grew up with, Owen Meany. Owen is dwarfish, has a very strange voice and with near transparent skin - a bit peculiar especially given that his family is in the granite quarrying business where you expect big, strong men, Owen is also religious, kind hearted and smart.  The narrator is illegitimate and lives with his mother at his grandmother's grand brick colonial on Front Street. He is named after his ancestor that founded the town. He is very much old blood whereas the Meany Family are new blood. Through this contrast, Irving explores friendship, God, religions, New Hampshire, heritage, politics, predestination, faith, Puritans and Yankees. At the center of all this is God's messenger, Owen Meany and his greatest admirer, John Wheelwright.

If you haven't read any Irving since The World According to Garp, try this novel. I am partial to it as my favorite Irving because Gravesend really is Exeter, NH and the novel takes place in the same time period as when my mother was growing up in the nearby town of Newmarket, NH.  My mom tells me that her and her brother took this same train as mentioned in this novel. I like to imagine New Hampshire back when there were still trains running. Outside of this personal revelation, I think you'll find your own reasons for liking this novel.

• Amazon readers ratings: from 1017 reviews

(back to top)

---

"The Cider House Rules"

(Reviewd by Judi Clark APR 10, 1999)

Cider House Rules is about abortion in the days before Roe VS Wade when there was a kind doctor who would either take in young girls who wanted to give up their babies for adoption or to prevent those babies from ever coming into the world. There are other stories mixed in here even one of first love.

St. Cloud's is an orphanage located far upriver in an old logging town of Maine. Dr. Wilbur Larch is a celibate physician that directs the orphanage, delivers babies and performs abortions illegally.  ("You either get an abortion or an orphan...") He is the spiritual father to orphan Homer Wells, who he informally teaches the gynecology business. Dr. Larch is worried that they will one day close his business and women will not have a place to go.  So he falsifies some records, makes Homer a physician and then attributes some antiabortion rhetoric to him as a cover so that the board will hire him.  It turns out that antiabortion rhetoric is closer to Homer's real opinion on abortion and he pulls back from the place that's been prepared for him.

This is probably Irving's most serious novel but done with the same spellbinding knack to make us see, smell, hear and believe everything we are told. Irving usually leave me with one or two strong images and this one it of migrant workers at an Apple Farm located near the ocean. After reading this novel, I couldn't pass old Old Orchard Beach in Maine without this scene in my head.  

• Amazon readers ratings: from 337 reviews

(back to top)

---

"The World According to Garp"

(Reviewed by Judi Clark APR 10, 1999)

When I think of Garp, I am in a Boston Back Bay apartment on a Sunday afternoon. There were about six of us hanging around waiting.  Earlier in the day we had lost Tim to The World According to Garp. He was reading in one of the back bedrooms. We'd all read the book already and knew Tim was almost to the middle of the book - to the "driveway scene."  "Aw, Gawwwd!" we hear from the back bedroom.  Tim had hit the scene. 

I wasn't going to include this novel because I didn't believe there could be a soul left who hadn't read it already, except maybe those that saw the movie. But it's been twenty years since it was published and it is time for a reread. I know I'd like to see those wild characters and crazy scenes again.   Do you know what's it like to go to Vienna AFTER you've read John Irving?  My friends and I could not stop giggling in the pension we had chosen to stay in. We were living Irving scenes from Garp and The Hotel New Hampshire. OK, enough memories, I promise to reread the book and write a straight synopsis.

• Amazon readers ratings: from 270 reviews

(back to top)

---

Bibliography: (with links to Amazon.com)

• Setting Free the Bears (1968)
• The Water Method Man (1972)
• The 158 Pound Marriage (1974)
• The World According to Garp (1978)
• The Hotel New Hampshire (1981)
• The Cider House Rules (1985)
• A Prayer for Owen Meany (1989)
• A Son of the Circus (1994)
• Trying to Save Piggy Sneed (1996)
• A Widow for One Year (1998)
• The Fourth Hand (July 2001)
• Until I Find You (July 2005)

Non-Fiction

• The Imaginary Girlfriend: A Memoir (1997)
• My Movie Business: A Memoir (1999)

E-Book Study Guide:

• Study Guide for THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP (July 2002)
• Study Guide for A PRAYER FOR OWEN MEANY (July 2002)

Movies from books:

• The World According to Garp  (1982)
• Hotel New Hampshire (1984)
• Simon Birch  (1998)
• Cider House Rules (1999)

 

(back to top)

---

Book Marks:

• Randomhouse John Irving site
• The New York Times® life and times of John Irving
• Salon Magazine interview with John Irving
• Mother Jones article on John Irving
• Reading guide and excerpt for The World According to Garp
• Reading guide and excerpt for Hotel New Hampshire
• Reading guide and excerpt for The Cider House Rules
• New Movie! The Cider House Rules to release December 17, 1999
• sonic.net review of The Cider House Rules
• Reading guide and excerpt for A Prayer for Owen Meany
• Movie review of Simon Birch, "suggested by" A Prayer for Owen Meany
• Washington Post Chapter One excerpt from Trying to Save Piggy Sneed
• Excerpt for A Widow for One Year
• Bookpage review of A Widow for One Year
• CNN Interactive review of A Widow for One Year
• Milwaukee Journal Sentinel review of A Widow for One Year
• Reading guide and excerpt for The Fourth Hand
• The New York Times review of The Fourth Hand
• Booksense review of The Fourth Hand
• January Magazine review of The Fourth Hand
• The Washington Post review of The Fourth Hand
• Complete Review on Until I Find You
• SF Gate review of Until I Find You
• Boston.com review of Until I Find You

 

(back to top)

---

About the Author:

John Irving was born in Exeter, NH in 1942 and grew up right on Front Street. His father taught history at Phillips-Exeter Academy, giving John automatic admittance to attend the prep school.  He went the University of New Hampshire and while there, participated in the study-abroad program in Vienna. He married his first wife while an undergraduate and had his first of three sons at 23.  Irving's first teaching job was at Windham College in Vermont. He divorced his first wife in 1981 and later married his agent, Janet Turnbull, a Canadian.  Irving lives in Toronto and Vermont with Janet and their young son Everett.