I've read this more than once and can say it is my favourite J Irving novel. It has a tapestry of warmth to it.

Oof. This is gonna be a tough one to review. First, it should be known that I was not looking forward to this book. Nothing about it called to me. Nothing about the film adaptation ever made me want to watch the movie, either. (Let it be known that I still have no interest in watching the movie.) And if it weren't for this John Irving Challenge I'm doing, where I'm trying to read all of his novels in a year's time, I likely never would have picked this up. Do I regret reading it? Yes and no. Let...

Maine 1920's - 1950's.St. Cloud's Maine is a little burg with a paper mill and an orphanage. The paper mill closes down and the orphanage is all that is left. Dr. Larch runs the orphanage and feels that he is 'of use' because he helps women either bear their child and leave it at the orphanage or give them a safe abortion.Homer Wells is one of the orphans. 4 attempts are made to adopt him. None work out so he comes back to the orphanage to stay. Larch trains him to be a midwife. Homer can delive...

How the bigotry, insanity, and inhumanity of institutionalized stigmatization of and hatred against women, especially regarding pregnancy, marriage and the control about bastardization of humans, lead to disgusting world views and practices that were omnipresent just a few decades ago and still are in many parts of the world, is a key element of the novel. Orphanages for kids that could have parents, but are born under the stigma of being illegitimate and thereby the societal death and endless

What can I say about this beautiful book?Only that I wanted to stroke its pages...Only that it brought a lump in my throat that is always there whenever I think of it.

"I have made an orphan; his name is Homer Wells and he will belong to St. Cloud’s forever.”John Irving knows how to write a story. He knows which words to use to start a movie playing in the reader's mind as soon as their eyes take in the first sentence. Perhaps that's why several of his books have been made into movies, because someone read it, saw the movie play out, and thought, Damn, this book is a good movie!I have not seen "The Cider House Rules" movie, not the one with Charlize Theron and...

In other parts of the world, they love John Green. Here in St. JR's, we love John Irving. According to my dictionary, Green is of the color of growing foliage, between yellow and blue in the color wheel. While Irving on the other hand, is a genius, hard-working, persevering person who can manage time efficiently; knows how to balance important aspects of life. This has led me to conclude that Irving is a much more suitable name for a writer than Green, and has also solidified my belief that Irvi...

While The Cider House Rules is an undeniably well-written novel, I grew impatient with the lengthy narrative and the idle characters. It was hard for me to feel any sense of connection to the different characters, and I cared very little about Homer's life at Ocean View - I was always anxious to get back to St. Cloud's and the orphanage. For me, the real story was about the relationship between Dr. Larch and Homer Wells, and I lost interest in the story once Larch and Homer ceased to communicate...

Well, after two long and somewhat tedious months, I have managed to push myself through to the other side, and I'm ecstatic to say, I have finally finished The Cider House Rules. This was a massive disappointment to say the least, and as always, I'll explain why.This book has many positive and glowing reviews, but for me on a personal level, it did absolutely nothing for my pleasure as a reader, or, my mental health. ( I wanted to desperately give this book away)The Cider House Rules could have

4.5I found the first 200 pages of this book to be just okay. They flew by fairly quickly and I was more or less enjoying it, but I can't say I cared too much either. It took me a little while to adjust to the writing style too, in particular the way it seemed to jump from one thing to another with little warning. At some point I realised I'd gotten used to this, and had found some sort of firm footing as I read.What's interesting for me about this is that there were many times when I didn't real...

I started the Cider House Rules after giving up on 3 novels that just couldn't hold my attention.John Irving will certainly make you love reading again. The Cider House Rules is once again a novel rich with characters so real you forget this is fiction and you care about what happens to them.Why can I only say that about a mere handful of writers?This is a novel about abortion in the 1940s. The dilemmas of abortion are obvious, and this novel does lean towards pro-choice. I think pro-lifers woul...

I just finished reading this novel, and it is so phenominal that I'm almost speechless, and I'm sad that it is over. The story is engrossing, rich, moving, tragic, and satisfying, and the imagery is extraordinarily powerful. The plot takes place during the first half of the 1900's in rural Maine, and tells of Dr. Larch, an obstetrician, founder of an orphanage, abortionist, and ether addict, and his favorite orphan, and heroic figure, Homer Wells. Irving develops the characters superbly, such th...

Incredible book. You can watch my review here - http://youtu.be/NINrIZE1Dco

By now, every person I associate with on a regular basis knows how big a John Irving fan I am. It’s no secret that I think he is, arguably, the greatest living writer (with respect to Thomas Pynchon, Joyce Carol Oates, Toni Morrison, etc), and he has penned a number of modern American classics. I had read all the works from his “classic” period, except for one. The Cider House Rules.It was time to get rid of this blindspot.I spent almost a week within the pages of this long novel. I spent a lot

I shouldn't be throwing semicolons around too often; and yet, after reading Irving, what do I find myself doing? semicolon, semicolon, SEMICOLON ; ; ; ; I'm not winking at you; those are semicolons.. now you know what I mean. Irving affects me in many ways -- the semicolons are just one example. (And yes, I know I'm probably not using them correctly -- you don't have to point that out. You really don't.) More than a week after finishing, The Cider House Rules, it's still on my mind, still sneaki...

I really can't stand John Irving's style of writing. This was a six hundred page novel that should have been three hundred. Also, I found it to be a little heavy-handed. He admits that it is deliberately didactic, but I think he pushes it the the point that it starts working against him. Any character opposing his ideals is put up as a two-dimensional straw man that he villainizes and knocks down, which doesn't help convince anyone of his views. I was surprised to learn that he wrote the screenp...

Hey! I just plucked my first John Irving with The Cider House Rules!Something strange happened midway through reading The Cider House Rules, my first John Irving book.* I found myself completely immersed in its world.What’s strange is that for the first couple hundred pages, I didn’t particularly believe in this early 20th century Dickensian fable about orphans, surrogate families, an ether-addicted abortionist and the arbitrariness of some rules. But Irving’s storytelling skills eventually won

This is a pretty hefty novel, but so worth it!It covers an expanse of characters' history - the main one being Homer, a young boy brought up in an orphanage his entire life. The orphanage is connected to a hospital where secret abortions are performed.Homer becomes assistant to Dr. Larch and learns the trade, before having a moral struggle, and chooses to leave the orphanage to live with a couple who have recently visited.He moves to their farm, where they grow apples to make cider and Homer's l...

I was actually really surprised at how much I enjoyed this book. I am VERY Pro-Life and was very skeptical before about picking it up...although I love John Irving as an author. He is excellent at character development and his stories are so multifaceted that you are never disappointed. This is certainly true here in this novel. My surprisingly favorite character was Melony. She was hauntingly creepy, pathetically adorable and demanding of your attention although not a primary character. I loved...

In our daily live we’re constantly confronted with rules, conventions, and arrangements; a lot of them are formal (laws or coded regulations), but most are informal. It is a very important part of a process of growing up to get to know these rules and learn to cope with them. It is also a never ending job, because the rules constantly change, as there is a lot of contradiction between them, but especially as people tend to disregard the rules and live their own lives. Even more, it is almost imp...