After reading "A Prayer for Owen Meany" I was excited about reading some more John Irving, so I picked up "The Fourth Hand" and managed to blow through it in a few days. (Lots of delayed plane flights helped speed along the reading.) While I consumed the book quickly and enjoyed reading it, I can't really say I think it's that good. It lacks the depth of Owen Meany and it has a few continuity problems. The book can be described as
1) 55% weird love story about a one handed man and a widow.
2) 35% exposition about how the media over report tragedies while ignoring the context.
3) 10% tangent about a doctor who does hand transplants.
My biggest problem is with item number 2. Writing a novel that really explores today's media frenzy for tragedy and oddity is a good theme. However, I just didn't feel it fit naturally into this book. The protagonist is a reporter who lost his hand to lions on television during a broadcast and later becomes the news network's reporter for all other bizarre tragedies and events. He constantly is thinking or talking about his dislike of the news coverage and how he'd like to change it, but all of this seems to sit on top of the novel rather than work as an essential part of it. The commentary doesn't drive the novel forward and has almost no interaction with the love story. And the chapter about the doctor is simply out of place, the doctor and his life is so thoroughly introduced but then pretty much dropped from the novel, though I admit it was one of my favorite chapters.
I also bought "The World According to Garp" (both books were on sale at Borders) but I think I'm going to hold off on reading it for a while.
