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4.03 AVERAGE


I found it quite a dull read and ended up flicking through to (like Jillsy Sloper) 'find out what happens'. I suppose there might be something profound in there, and it's certainly neatly ironic, but the characters, their happenings and the language did not engage me.
adventurous challenging emotional inspiring reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I finished this book and kept trying to make it, in my head, a better book than I thought it was. Because it's John Irving. But bottom line, it didn't move me, at all. 600 plus pages and I didn't care about any of the characters. Irving may have been making some interesting points about the women's movement and the way we hurt each other unintentionally and unintended consequences but it seems to me he could have done that in a essay. When I read a novel I want, first and foremost, to be moved by the characters and to care about their lives. I just didn't in this book. And that's a heck of a lot of pages to read and still not be moved by a single character.

1kraussgirl's review against another edition

DID NOT FINISH

Didn’t find this book interesting enough to continue.
emotional funny medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

jeanniereads4life's review against another edition

DID NOT FINISH: 37%

I just couldn’t keep going. At first I enjoyed it but then there was the infidelity and the book he wrote about infidelity and I realized their book is not what I want to be reading! Over…done. I almost NEVER DNF a book. Oh well. 
dark emotional funny inspiring sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

strange, but compelling.

I have to say I was really worried that I would find this book boring. It seemed like it just kept going on and on with no real point but I think it was kinda nice. I definitely spent the last whole chapter crying. It was so easy to connect with these characters and genuinely live through them in the story. Usually I also do like a book that changes its point of view but this book did it so fluidly that it almost seemed wrong to NOT know what the other people in the book where doing and thinking. Towards the middle we get this kinda foreshadowing from Garp about how he hadn’t experienced death, so for him to experience it so tragically one after the other was actually kinda humorous in a gruesome way. Which I think is exactly how I think it could’ve been intended. Either way, this was an amazing book and I’m really happy I read it. Now to watch the movie and see what they left out!

Read this book only because Stephen King said it was his favorite book. Reading a lot of Stephen King I wanted to read it to see why he liked it so much.

That being said wow what a great strange story

"The World According to Garp is John Irving's fourth novel, about a man, born out of wedlock to a feminist leader, who grows up to be a writer." Summary without spoiling the story