The Fourth Hand - John Irving

'Imagine a young man on his way to a less than thirty second event - the loss of his left hand, long before he reached middle age...' This is the doorway by which we meet Patrick Wallingford, John Irving's character in the book, firth published in 2001. Those of you who do not know, Mr Irving is the best-selling American author. Born in New Hampshire in 1942, John Winslow Irving is the author of more than ten novels, among them 'The Cider House Rules,' 'The World According to Garp' and 'A Widow for one Year.' Irving is married to Janet and they have three sons. He lives in Toronto and in southern Vermont. I have been reading his works on and off for ...  Read the complete review

I hate to say this but, I think I'm going to have to stop reading books by John Irving. How sad does that sound? Pretty sad, huh? Well, I'm afraid that's how I feel, and while I didn't hate The Fourth Hand, my overall feeling after reading this book was one of "so, what?". Let me try to explain. This story revolves around the character Patrick Wallingford - an unusually attractive man but only a second-rate television news reporter who never seemed to have gotten the really good stories. Then, he becomes a headline himself when a lion bites his hand off during the filming of a piece on a circus in India. After that incident, his career takes an ...  Read the complete review

John Irving could be regarded as the Charles Dickens of the twentieth century, and so it is fitting that his most recent book, in the twenty-first century, reveals a new flavour and direction to his writing. Those of you familiar with Irving’s many large novels will immediately note the relative thinness of The Fourth Hand (in the shops now), and perhaps wonder (as I did) if this is really an Irving novel. Surely it’s missing a few hundred pages, you’ll say to yourself, surely this is volume one of a soon-to-be-completed three volume set? But no, it is a short Irving novel, about the same size as The 158 Pound Marriage. There, wham!, I just ...  Read the complete review