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Prayer for Owen Meany
by John Irving
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About This Book
ISBN13: 9780345361790 |
Powells.com Staff Pick
On one list are the books you like to recommend. You want to turn on someone to your favorite unknown author or introduce them to the season's latest, greatest novel. If you've read widely enough over the years, you'll match reader to occasion. The list comes to include something for just about anyone in any setting:
Funny books and smart ones; easy and hard; books that teach and those that entertain; pages best turned at the beach, on a plane, or sick in bed; a pick for the woman you want to impress or the friend who reads mostly in ten-minute bursts between cab fares; dry, plotless affairs that ease you toward sleep or blazers that set your mind racing, keep you up late into the night.
A much shorter list contains the sure bets — the ones that work for just about any reader, young or old, anywhere, at any time. A Prayer for Owen Meany may be the only book on my second list.
You get OWEN MEANY'S SQUEAKY VOICE into a person's head and the worst they'll ever say is they loved it. Without fail, they will thank you. [See our guarantee.] Three people I've given it to, years and oceans apart, reported back that it had become their favorite novel of all-time.
"Which one do I read next?" they all ask, so swiftly converted. (Often they're not even done with the book and already they're planning ahead. Anxiety has set in, a debilitating abandonment neurosis symptomatic of the last hundred pages.) "Take your pick," tell them. The World According to Garp, The Cider House Rules, The Hotel New Hampshire, A Widow for One Year... Dave, Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
Publisher Comments:
In the summer of 1953, two 11-year-old boys — best friends — are playing in a Little League baseball game in New Hampshire. One of the boys hits a foul ball that kills his best friend's mother. Owen Meany believes he didn't hit the ball by accident. He believes he is God's instrument. What happens to Owen after 1953 is extraordinary and terrifying. He is Irving's most heartbreaking hero.
Review:
"Superbly narrated sequences of comic action... Irving is particularly good at rendering the dynamics of things — he has a Dickensian ability to juxtapose and animate unpromising objects? [as in] the book's grand and brilliantly conceived final scene....You don't just read Irving, you listen to him." The New Republic
Review:
"Extraordinary, so original, and so enriching....A rare creation in the somehow exhausted world of late 20th century fiction....Readers will come to the end feeling sorry to leave [this] richly textured and carefully wrought world." Stephen King, The Washington Post Book World
Review:
"Roomy, intelligent, exhilarating, and darkly comic....Dickensian in
scope....Quite stunning and very ambitious." Los Angeles Times Book Review
Review:
"A lavish meditation on predestination, faith, and the unrealized forces that shape one's days." San Francisco Chronicle
Review:
"John Irving is an abundantly and even joyfully talented storyteller." The New York Times Book Review
Review:
"Vintage Irving....A boisterous cast, a spirited joy." Time
Review:
"A Prayer for Owen Meany leaps off the pages with an imaginative passion that is startling....This is John Irving at full throttle: a riveting narrative, a cast of richly developed characters, and a story as complex and unbelievable as life itself....[A] joyous, provocative read!" Playboy
Review:
"I have been a voracious reader since childhood, and while I've read and loved many, many books, I can honestly say that A Prayer for Owen Meany is my all-time favorite! It is such an extraordinarily funny, moving and heartbreaking story and the ending is the best and most satisfying one I've ever read. The highlight of my first year working for Ballantine Books was attending a reading John Irving gave for the paperback publication. Owen Meany has a very memorable voice when you read the book, so you can imagine how exciting it was for me to hear my favorite author read my favorite book and do the voice of Owen Meany!" M. Coolman, Ballantine Publicity
Review:
"Riveting...Owen Meany, drawn in bold strokes, burns in the mind's eye — vivid, alive, beloved — long after the turning of the final page." UPI
Review:
"One of the most subtle and brilliant artistic examinations yet of America and America's involvement in Vietnam." San Jose Mercury News
Review:
"A wondrous novel... ultimately beguiling in its soulful account of a remarkable friendship... Irving's ability to create idiosyncratic characters and put them through weirdly ridiculous yet realistic paces has never been in finer fettle. Humor partnered with compassion, wisdom with absurdity, leave the reader both mirthful and tearful." Booklist
Review:
"[Mr. Irving] is more than popular. He is a Populist, determined to keep alive the Dickensian tradition that revels in colorful set pieces and teaches moral lessons....More than any of his novels since Garp, A Prayer for Owen Meany embraces those 19th-century qualities." The New York Times
Synopsis:
Owen Meany, the only child of a New Hampshire granite quarrier, believes he is God's instrument; he is.
This is John Irving's most comic novel, yet Owen Meany is Mr. Irving's most heartbreaking character.
" Roomy, intelligent, exhilarating and darkly comic...Dickensian in scope....Quite stunning and very ambitious."
LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK REVIEW
" John Irving is an abundantly and even joyfully talented storyteller."
THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOKR EVIEW
About the Author
John Irving published his first novel at the age of twenty-six. He has received awards from the Rockefeller Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Guggenheim Foundation; he has won an O. Henry Award, a National Book Award, and an Academy Award. Mr. Irving lives with his family in Toronto and Vermont.
What Our Readers Are Saying
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Average customer rating based on 5 comments:
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ambriaz, November 8, 2007 (view all comments by ambriaz)
A true gem of a read! Although historical, this story stands out as a cautionary tale against seeing the "other" as evil. It's timeless in its approach. And it's one to pass on to your friends!
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Shoshana, August 24, 2007 (view all comments by Shoshana)
I know that people love this, and I did find it moving at times. However, I also experienced it as reasonably clunky, with a strained plot and awkward prose. The point I thought was most compelling--How did the narrator become such a timid, rigid, doubting man?--was not answered by his developmental narrative. Perhaps the point is that even in the face of incontrovertable evidence, we still lack faith.
This novel has characters and plot elements that will be familiar; as an example, the gruff yet attractive female relative who inspires incestuous longings is easy to spot, as are many other Irving archetypes. I find this tedious; perhaps others find it enjoyably familiar.
Without spoiling the plot, I will say that most of the pleasure I derived from the book had to do with reading (and leaving) it in Vietnam.
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alicepotter, April 14, 2007 (view all comments by alicepotter)
I don't think I have ever read a more touching, well-written, all-around HUMAN book in my life. John Irving has an amazing ability to understand society. His political, religious, and social comments throughout the novel are very profound. I loved this book more than any that I have read in a long time; I felt like I actually knew and was friends with the characters. Although this book is set in the Vietnam-era, I would recommend it to anyone who is willing to think openly and in an unbiased way about the American lifestyle today. Wonderful story, wonderfully written.
View all 5 comments
Product Details
- ISBN:
- 9780345361790
- Author:
- Publisher:
- Ballantine Books
- Location:
- New York
- Subject:
- Non-Classifiable
- Subject:
- Literary
- Subject:
- Fiction
- Subject:
- Friendship
- Subject:
- American fiction (fictional works by one author)
- Copyright:
- 1989
- Edition Number:
- 1st mass market ed.
- Edition Description:
- Mass Market
- Series Volume:
- 7
- Publication Date:
- May 1990
- Binding:
- Mass Market Paperbound
- Language:
- English
- Illustrations:
- Yes
- Pages:
- 640
- Dimensions:
- 6.85x4.19x1.03 in. .64 lbs.
