There is something of Byron about John Irving. Not only is it that he woke after the publication of The World According to Garp to find himself famous, but the extremity of his opinions and the nervous violence of his language recall that intemperate nobleman, and, like Byron, he would certainly say that love is no sinecure. Indeed, nothing in life is easy for Irving's characters, and in his five novels the still, sad music of humanity rises to the orgasmic uproar of a rock band. (p. 1)

Those who admired Garp will find the new novel, The Hotel New Hampshire, very much to their taste. Irving has expressed himself strongly on the subject of reviewers, so I shall not commit the reviewer's sin of spilling the beans about his story. It is enough to say that it is in the powerful, reader-coaxing mode of his earlier books, and...