Some time ago I was a guest at a book festival in France where we were invited to dinner in the town hall with local dignitaries. I was asked if I liked asparagus. I do, I said, thinking of delicious green spears. Good, said the woman in charge, as it was the asparagus season. I was then presented with an enormous plate of leek-sized white asparagus with a tiny dab of hollandaise on the side, and then expected to eat my way through essentially a fibrous albino python as the dignitaries looked on expectantly. It was a long evening.
I mention this because that’s basically what the experience of reading this book is like. A fellow reviewer demurred and said, no, it’s more akin to dragging your broken leg down a mountain, à la Touching the Void.
The thing is, John Irving is a genius –a comic, warm, brilliant genius.
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