Irving's Queen Esther Review – An Underwhelming Companion to The Cider House Rules

If a few writers have an golden era, during which they reach the heights consistently, then U.S. author John Irving’s extended through a sequence of four long, gratifying novels, from his late-seventies success His Garp Novel to the 1989 release Owen Meany. Such were expansive, funny, warm novels, tying protagonists he calls “misfits” to social issues from gender equality to termination.

Since His Owen Meany Novel, it’s been declining results, aside from in size. His most recent work, the 2022 release The Last Chairlift, was 900 pages in length of themes Irving had explored better in previous works (mutism, short stature, gender identity), with a two-hundred-page screenplay in the middle to fill it out – as if padding were required.

Thus we look at a new Irving with caution but still a faint spark of hope, which burns brighter when we find out that Queen Esther – a mere four hundred thirty-two pages long – “returns to the universe of His Cider House Rules”. That mid-eighties book is part of Irving’s top-tier novels, set largely in an institution in the town of St Cloud’s, run by Wilbur Larch and his apprentice Homer Wells.

Queen Esther is a failure from a writer who in the past gave such pleasure

In Cider House, Irving explored abortion and acceptance with vibrancy, wit and an total empathy. And it was a significant work because it abandoned the topics that were evolving into annoying habits in his novels: the sport of wrestling, wild bears, Austrian capital, sex work.

This book begins in the fictional village of Penacook, New Hampshire in the twentieth century's dawn, where Mr. and Mrs. Winslow take in teenage orphan the title character from the orphanage. We are a few decades prior to the events of His Earlier Novel, yet Dr Larch stays recognisable: already addicted to anesthetic, respected by his staff, starting every speech with “In this place...” But his presence in the book is confined to these initial sections.

The couple are concerned about parenting Esther well: she’s of Jewish faith, and “how might they help a young Jewish girl discover her identity?” To tackle that, we move forward to Esther’s later life in the twenties era. She will be a member of the Jewish migration to the region, where she will join the paramilitary group, the Jewish nationalist paramilitary group whose “goal was to protect Jewish towns from hostile actions” and which would subsequently form the core of the Israeli Defense Forces.

Such are enormous themes to address, but having introduced them, Irving backs away. Because if it’s regrettable that this book is not actually about the orphanage and Wilbur Larch, it’s still more disappointing that it’s likewise not about the main character. For reasons that must relate to plot engineering, Esther ends up as a substitute parent for another of the family's daughters, and delivers to a male child, Jimmy, in World War II era – and the majority of this book is Jimmy’s narrative.

And now is where Irving’s preoccupations return strongly, both regular and distinct. Jimmy relocates to – of course – the Austrian capital; there’s discussion of dodging the Vietnam draft through self-mutilation (Owen Meany); a dog with a significant designation (the animal, remember the earlier dog from Hotel New Hampshire); as well as wrestling, streetwalkers, novelists and male anatomy (Irving’s throughout).

The character is a more mundane character than the female lead suggested to be, and the minor players, such as students the two students, and Jimmy’s instructor Eissler, are underdeveloped too. There are a few nice episodes – Jimmy deflowering; a brawl where a couple of ruffians get assaulted with a walking aid and a tire pump – but they’re here and gone.

Irving has never been a delicate author, but that is is not the issue. He has repeatedly restated his arguments, telegraphed narrative turns and let them to build up in the viewer's imagination before bringing them to fruition in extended, shocking, funny sequences. For case, in Irving’s works, physical elements tend to be lost: remember the speech organ in Garp, the hand part in Owen Meany. Those losses resonate through the narrative. In the book, a key person is deprived of an limb – but we merely discover thirty pages before the finish.

She comes back in the final part in the story, but just with a last-minute sense of concluding. We do not discover the entire story of her time in the Middle East. This novel is a letdown from a writer who in the past gave such joy. That’s the negative aspect. The good news is that The Cider House Rules – I reread it together with this work – still remains beautifully, four decades later. So read the earlier work in its place: it’s much longer as the new novel, but a dozen times as great.