Kerri's Reviews > The Cider House Rules

** spoiler alert ** 4.5
I 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 really care about what was happening, I wasn't that interested in Homer or his life or Candy, who I had wildly mixed feelings about, but I still liked the book. I was mulling over that as I finished the final pages, when a line ended up summing up perfectly what I felt:

('Here in St. Cloud's,' Wilber Larch had written, 'we learn to love the difficult.')

Something that was slightly annoying for me is that the blurb on my copy of the book refers to Homer's, 'strange relationship with the wife of his closest friend.' Which meant that the entire time Wally is missing, I knew he had to be alive and would return and marry Candy! An odd decision to give that away.

Dr. Larch is the only character I liked for the entirety of the book, described in the same blurb as, 'a man of rare compassion and with an addiction to ether.'

One of my favourite of Larch's observations is this one, regarding croquet:

'From a watercolor of some strange lawn games, he had once imagined that striking a wooden ball with a wooden mallet as hard as he could would be rewarding, but he wanted time to practice this art alone and unobserved.'

I feel that way about many things-- I wouldn't mind trying it, but certainly not in front of many people, especially if those people already know what to do!

Overall a book I did enjoy. I want to read more by John Irving, especially 'The World According to Garp', since I loved the movie. I will also try to find the movie version of 'The Cider House Rules', since I have heard it is good. 🍎