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If a few writers experience an imperial era, in which they reach the heights repeatedly, then U.S. novelist John Irving’s extended through a series of several substantial, satisfying novels, from his late-seventies hit Garp to the 1989 release A Prayer for Owen Meany. Those were expansive, witty, big-hearted novels, tying characters he calls “outsiders” to societal topics from feminism to termination.

Since His Owen Meany Novel, it’s been declining returns, aside from in page length. His most recent book, 2022’s The Chairlift Book, was nine hundred pages of themes Irving had explored better in prior novels (selective mutism, short stature, transgenderism), with a 200-page screenplay in the heart to pad it out – as if extra material were necessary.

So we come to a new Irving with caution but still a tiny spark of expectation, which burns stronger when we discover that Queen Esther – a just 432 pages long – “revisits the setting of The Cider House Rules”. That mid-eighties novel is part of Irving’s finest books, taking place largely in an institution in Maine's St Cloud’s, run by Dr Wilbur Larch and his apprentice Homer.

This novel is a failure from a novelist who once gave such joy

In Cider House, Irving wrote about abortion and acceptance with colour, wit and an all-encompassing compassion. And it was a significant work because it abandoned the subjects that were evolving into annoying patterns in his works: wrestling, ursine creatures, Vienna, the oldest profession.

This book starts in the fictional village of Penacook, New Hampshire in the beginning of the 1900s, where Thomas and Constance Winslow adopt 14-year-old orphan Esther from St Cloud’s. We are a few decades prior to the events of Cider House, yet Dr Larch remains familiar: even then dependent on ether, beloved by his nurses, starting every talk with “Here in St Cloud’s …” But his presence in Queen Esther is confined to these initial sections.

The couple are concerned about raising Esther correctly: she’s of Jewish faith, and “in what way could they help a teenage Jewish female find herself?” To answer that, we jump ahead to Esther’s grown-up years in the Roaring Twenties. She will be involved of the Jewish exodus to the region, where she will become part of the Haganah, the Jewish nationalist militant organisation whose “goal was to safeguard Jewish towns from opposition” and which would subsequently become the basis of the IDF.

Such are huge subjects to address, but having brought in them, Irving backs away. Because if it’s regrettable that the novel is not really about St Cloud’s and Dr Larch, it’s still more upsetting that it’s also not really concerning Esther. For reasons that must involve plot engineering, Esther becomes a gestational carrier for one more of the Winslows’ offspring, and gives birth to a male child, James, in World War II era – and the majority of this novel is Jimmy’s story.

And at this point is where Irving’s preoccupations come roaring back, both regular and specific. Jimmy moves to – where else? – Vienna; there’s discussion of avoiding the Vietnam draft through bodily injury (A Prayer for Owen Meany); a dog with a meaningful title (Hard Rain, remember the earlier dog from His Hotel Novel); as well as grappling, streetwalkers, authors and male anatomy (Irving’s passim).

He is a duller persona than the female lead hinted to be, and the secondary figures, such as students Claude and Jolanda, and Jimmy’s teacher Annelies Eissler, are flat as well. There are some nice episodes – Jimmy losing his virginity; a fight where a couple of bullies get assaulted with a support and a tire pump – but they’re short-lived.

Irving has never been a subtle novelist, but that is isn't the problem. He has consistently repeated his arguments, hinted at plot developments and enabled them to gather in the audience's imagination before bringing them to fruition in lengthy, shocking, amusing scenes. For example, in Irving’s books, physical elements tend to go missing: remember the tongue in Garp, the finger in Owen Meany. Those absences resonate through the story. In the book, a central figure suffers the loss of an limb – but we just learn thirty pages later the end.

She reappears toward the end in the novel, but merely with a final feeling of concluding. We not once learn the full account of her life in the Middle East. Queen Esther is a disappointment from a novelist who in the past gave such delight. That’s the negative aspect. The good news is that Cider House – revisiting it in parallel to this book – yet remains wonderfully, 40 years on. So pick up it as an alternative: it’s much longer as this book, but a dozen times as enjoyable.