The Last Chairlift
The Last Chairlift by John Irving
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Genre: General fiction (Adult)
Format: Kindle
No. of Pages: 912
Date of US Publication: 18 October, 2022
My Rating: 4 Stars
My Thoughts
Full of a super close Mother-son relationship, a closer relationship with his maternal grandmother, very close friendship with a female cousin, a friend lost in Vietnam, and a New England setting, this gave me fairly strong reminders of A Prayer for Owen Meany while still being its own magnificent story.
The Last Chairlift is ultimate Irving. Besides being his first novel in 7 years, this is his self-proclaimed last long novel and fans will feast on it. This is a nice lengthy novel, with nearly 16 hours of reading time; for that reason I recommend this title in audio book format; I think I would have enjoyed my reading of this even more if I had been able to get some miles in on the treadmill while reading.
This title is a must for Irving devotees but I probably wouldn’t recommend new readers begin with it.
eARC kindly provided by Simon & Schuster and NetGalley. Opinions shared are my own.
Description
John Irving, one of the world’s greatest novelists, returns with his first novel in seven years—a ghost story, a love story, and a lifetime of sexual politics.
In Aspen, Colorado, in 1941, Rachel Brewster is a slalom skier at the National Downhill and Slalom Championships. Little Ray, as she is called, finishes nowhere near the podium, but she manages to get pregnant. Back home, in New England, Little Ray becomes a ski instructor.
Her son, Adam, grows up in a family that defies conventions and evades questions concerning the eventful past. Years later, looking for answers, Adam will go to Aspen. In the Hotel Jerome, where he was conceived, Adam will meet some ghosts; in The Last Chairlift, they aren’t the first or the last ghosts he sees.
John Irving has written some of the most acclaimed books of our time—among them, The World According to Garp and The Cider House Rules. A visionary voice on the subject of sexual tolerance, Irving is a bard of alternative families. In The Last Chairlift, readers will once more be in his thrall.
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