Queen Esther by John Irving Evaluation – An Underwhelming Follow-up to The Cider House Rules

If some writers enjoy an peak period, where they reach the heights consistently, then U.S. writer John Irving’s lasted through a run of several long, gratifying books, from his 1978 success The World According to Garp to 1989’s Owen Meany. Such were generous, witty, compassionate novels, tying characters he calls “outsiders” to societal topics from women's rights to abortion.

Since His Owen Meany Novel, it’s been waning returns, aside from in page length. His last work, the 2022 release The Last Chairlift, was 900 pages in length of subjects Irving had explored better in earlier novels (selective mutism, dwarfism, gender identity), with a two-hundred-page script in the center to pad it out – as if extra material were needed.

So we approach a recent Irving with care but still a tiny spark of optimism, which burns hotter when we find out that His Queen Esther Novel – a mere four hundred thirty-two pages – “returns to the setting of The Cider House Novel”. That 1985 work is part of Irving’s very best books, taking place mostly in an children's home in the town of St Cloud’s, managed by Dr Wilbur Larch and his assistant Homer.

This novel is a failure from a author who in the past gave such pleasure

In Cider House, Irving discussed termination and belonging with richness, humor and an all-encompassing understanding. And it was a significant novel because it left behind the subjects that were evolving into annoying patterns in his books: the sport of wrestling, wild bears, Austrian capital, sex work.

The novel starts in the made-up town of Penacook, New Hampshire in the beginning of the 1900s, where Mr. and Mrs. Winslow adopt teenage ward the protagonist from the orphanage. We are a a number of years ahead of the storyline of Cider House, yet Dr Larch stays familiar: already dependent on ether, adored by his staff, beginning every talk with “Here in St Cloud’s …” But his presence in Queen Esther is restricted to these early scenes.

The family worry about parenting Esther properly: she’s Jewish, and “how could they help a adolescent Jewish female discover her identity?” To tackle that, we jump ahead to Esther’s grown-up years in the Roaring Twenties. She will be a member of the Jewish emigration to the region, where she will enter Haganah, the Jewish nationalist armed force whose “purpose was to safeguard Jewish communities from hostile actions” and which would eventually form the basis of the IDF.

These are massive subjects to tackle, but having brought in them, Irving dodges out. Because if it’s disappointing that Queen Esther is hardly about St Cloud's and Wilbur Larch, it’s even more upsetting that it’s likewise not really concerning the titular figure. For motivations that must involve plot engineering, Esther becomes a gestational carrier for a different of the couple's children, and gives birth to a son, Jimmy, in the early forties – and the majority of this book is his narrative.

And here is where Irving’s preoccupations come roaring back, both typical and specific. Jimmy relocates to – of course – Vienna; there’s discussion of dodging the draft notice through bodily injury (A Prayer for Owen Meany); a dog with a significant title (Hard Rain, recall the earlier dog from His Hotel Novel); as well as the sport, sex workers, writers and genitalia (Irving’s passim).

The character is a less interesting figure than the female lead suggested to be, and the supporting characters, such as pupils the pair, and Jimmy’s teacher Annelies Eissler, are one-dimensional as well. There are some enjoyable episodes – Jimmy losing his virginity; a fight where a few thugs get battered with a crutch and a tire pump – but they’re short-lived.

Irving has not once been a delicate writer, but that is not the difficulty. He has repeatedly reiterated his ideas, foreshadowed narrative turns and allowed them to build up in the audience's mind before leading them to resolution in lengthy, jarring, amusing sequences. For example, in Irving’s novels, body parts tend to go missing: recall the oral part in The Garp Novel, the digit in His Owen Book. Those missing pieces resonate through the plot. In the book, a major figure loses an arm – but we just discover thirty pages later the end.

Esther reappears late in the book, but just with a final sense of ending the story. We do not do find out the full account of her life in the Middle East. Queen Esther is a disappointment from a novelist who in the past gave such delight. That’s the negative aspect. The upside is that Cider House – I reread it alongside this book – still stands up excellently, 40 years on. So read that instead: it’s much longer as the new novel, but far as enjoyable.