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The Last Chairlift

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About this listen

 John Irving, one of the world’s greatest novelists, returns with his first novel in seven years — a ghost story, a love story, and a lifetime of sexual politics.

In Aspen, Colorado, in 1941, Rachel Brewster is a slalom skier at the National Downhill and Slalom Championships. Little Ray, as she is called, finishes nowhere near the podium, but she manages to get pregnant. Back home, in New England, Little Ray becomes a ski instructor.

Her son, Adam, grows up in a family that defies conventions and evades questions concerning the eventful past. Years later, looking for answers, Adam will go to Aspen. In the Hotel Jerome, where he was conceived, Adam will meet some ghosts; in The Last Chairlift, they aren’t the first or the last ghosts he sees.

John Irving has written some of the most acclaimed books of our time — among them, The World According to Garp and The Cider House Rules. A visionary voice on the subject of sexual tolerance, Irving is a bard of alternative families. In The Last Chairlift, readers will once more be in his thrall. Genre Fiction Ghosts Horror Literary Fiction Haunted Scary Fiction
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I rarely write reviews, but feel I should defend my rating of John Irving’s latest - perhaps last? - novel. First, let me say I’m an Irving fanboy, who compulsively read Garp, Owen Meany, Cider House Rules etc as a young man, and have continued to revisit them as I’ve aged. The Last Chairlift has an equally great book hidden within its 900 pages, replete with Irving’s compelling characters, wry observations and unmatched comic set-pieces. But it’s an absolute grind to complete. The fine eye for detail quickly became tedious repetition, and don’t even start me on the turgid screenplay-within-a-novel! Just tell the story, Mr Irving! Had it been tighter and shorter, this would have been a crowning adornment to the career of one of America’s greatest 20th century authors. As it is, it’s one for the Irving completists. If you’re not one of those, you’d better start with The Works According to Garp b

It’s TOO John Irving…

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So focussed on unnecessary details of wrestling and movie scripts .. I tried but I couldn’t stick with it

It was too long and repetitive

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