Alieschke Ungerer Ungerer itibaren Mollans-sur-Ouvèze, फ़्रांस itibaren Mollans-sur-Ouvèze, फ़्रांस

I can't believe that John Irving actually wrote this! I have NEVER been disappointed by a John Irving book; he is one of very favorite authors. Even when I've been turned off by a title and/or brief plot synopsis...like A PRAYER FOR OWEN MEANY or SON OF THE CIRCUS. I was leary of both, and they turned out to be two of my favorites. This one? I've given it 200 pages, hoping that it would at some point interest me, but nope. So I'm abandoning it. I don't think it's at all well written. Especially irritating: there is so much in parentheses, when usually there is no need for them. It has become quite distracting; I realized at some point that the most interesting thing I was doing while reading was seeing if whatever was in parentheses could have been out of parentheses, and the answer was almost always it could have and should have been. Also irritating: in one paragraph the protagonist is called Daniel, Dan and Danny...and this happens over and over. The seemingly endless descriptions and details of logging are very tiresome; and there are so many towns, logging camps, roads, rivers, lakes, and dams that I had trouble keeping track of all their names, until at some point I realized that it didn't really matter and I stopped trying. Likewise, the seemingly endless number of Italian surnames, often complicated ones, as well as variations on those surnames, and who was related to whom, and how: here again, after trying to keep them straight, I realized at some point that I didn't care and that it didn't much matter. I could believe it if I learned that this is a book Irving wrote when he was 18, or even that someone else wrote it. Very very disappointing. I have too many books on my "To Read" list to spend any more time on this one that I am not enjoying in the slightest.