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Tarfumes.com - A Prayer for Owen Meany
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List Price: $7.99
Our Price: $7.99
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780345361790
ISBN: 0345361792
Label: Ballantine Books
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 619
Publication Date: 1990-04-14
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Release Date: 1990-04-14
Studio: Ballantine Books
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Editorial Reviews:
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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
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Irving's best work
Comment: My recent purchase of A Prayer for Owen Meany was as a gift. Having read that work many years ago, as well as many other Irving books, I believe this to be his best. It is one that I recommend consistently to family and friends, and have found agreement with that opinion in those quarters.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Skeptical and bitter - but comically, heartbreakingly so.
Comment: Most of the negative reviews here are either completely missing an interpretive point of Irving's novel or they had certain expectations that were not met upon finishing. For one reviewer, it's contrived and implausible, and for another reviewer it insults Christianity. But Christianity is hardly (what I think is) the point...while contrived and implausible are exactly what the characters fight so hard for - and against - in this fantastic novel. It's ambitious, if not somewhat tedious. But it delivers.
I've never read Irving, and I faintly recall "Simon Birch" (and now I perfectly understand why Irving didn't want to be associated with the movie). I picked up "A Prayer For Owen Meany" because, as juvenile as it sounds, I'm like the band Jimmy Eat World and their song "Goodbye Sky Harbor" is taken completely from the final scene in the novel.
I wasn't expecting much when I began, but I had to suspend my initial belief for some of the plot events. Yes, some of the scenes felt contrived. Irving comes across as rather unctuous, and sometimes even self-righteous. I was nonetheless very entertained by the events and amazed at the intricate world Irving creates.
Enough has been said about the plot. Suffice it to say that I haven't read a book that kept me (willingly) up until dawn since I was eighteen. And I haven't felt my heart literally break for a character, as well as disappointment at finishing a novel, since I was fourteen when I read "Les Miserables" for the first time.
There are things I dislike about this book. At times, the tone comes across as cynical, despondent, and dour, but is intended to be playfully rueful. I had to use a dictionary a number of times and thought at first that it was very self-appreciating of Irving. But I began to see a thematic pattern in the verbiage that was satirical and at times even clever. Also, it's possible you'll never misuse a semi-colon once you finish this book since it's used so often - but it is sometimes used to excess.
All that aside, I loved this novel enough to get on here and write my first review, even though I've used Amazon for years. The characters wrestle with determinism/predestination, faith, loneliness, guilt, forgiveness, displacement, fear and death - and in surprising ways. Most of all, it is about infidelity with others and with oneself; compromise, hypocrisy and honesty...and storytelling itself. These struggles are set against the independent backdrop of religion, war and the caustic aftertaste of the illusory, postmodern American dream. To put it another way, Irving satisfyingly accomplishes what Yann Martel merely attempts with his more arrogant, overbearing "Life of Pi."
I recommend this book with a few reservations, but I recommend that you read it slowly and with an open mind. It's not nearly as bad as the other reviewers make it out to be - at least, not for the same reasons. I believe it sets out to ask: "At what moral point does responsibility meet fidelity, and can belief reconcile delusion with doubt?" If these questions interest you, you may find a few possible answers in "A Prayer For Owen Meany." Perhaps, like myself and others, you'll even find attachment to the characters halfway through. And you may also find your heart torn apart with heartbreak for the last pages and with disappointment for having come to the end, wanting to stay and finding that - like the narrator - you'll be forever "doomed" to remember that final scene with Owen Meany...and the prayer.
Customer Rating:
Summary: my favorite book
Comment: This is my very favorite book of my life! It is filled with memorable characters and circumstances. Laced with humor even through trials and the Viet Nam war. If you haven't yet read this book - do yourself a favor. It is incredible and you will remember it for the rest of your life!
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Best of Irving
Comment: What more is there to say about this book? It is an incredible read and I would rate this among my favorites of all time. Owen will be with me for a long time to come. Buy this book, sit back and enjoy the ride.
Customer Rating:
Summary: "Horrific" "Pretentious" and "Offensive" only begin to describe "Meany"
Comment:
Not only is this book horrifically offensive to Christianity by comparing an irritating and presumptuously arrogant dwarf to Jesus, but it is also in need of major editing. I won't bore anyone with a description of the plot, since it's one of the most lackluster stories I've ever read. This book meanders in the sections in which the narrator describes his present-day life. Also, it gives endless boring descriptions of characters that nobody cares about. It's all "telling" and no "showing". The imagery is something that a first-grader could have come up with ("the lake was wonderful," "the grass was wonderful," "the pines were wonderful," etc.)
If this book had been written by a rookie writer, it never would have been published. It's only because John Irving's name was on it that it got published. Anyone who thinks it's the best book they've ever read (as many of these reviewers do) sorely needs to get a life. A complete bore, "Owen Meany" isn't worth the wood-sludge that it was printed on.
ABSOLUTE 0/5!!!!!
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