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If certain authors enjoy an imperial period, in which they achieve the pinnacle repeatedly, then U.S. author John Irving’s ran through a run of four long, satisfying novels, from his late-seventies breakthrough His Garp Novel to 1989’s A Prayer for Owen Meany. These were generous, humorous, compassionate works, linking characters he refers to as “outliers” to social issues from women's rights to abortion.

Following His Owen Meany Novel, it’s been diminishing outcomes, aside from in size. His last book, 2022’s His Last Chairlift Novel, was 900 pages of subjects Irving had explored better in earlier works (inability to speak, dwarfism, gender identity), with a lengthy film script in the center to extend it – as if padding were needed.

Therefore we approach a new Irving with reservation but still a small glimmer of optimism, which burns brighter when we learn that Queen Esther – a mere four hundred thirty-two pages long – “returns to the world of The Cider House Novel”. That 1985 work is part of Irving’s very best books, taking place mostly in an children's home in St Cloud’s, Maine, run by Dr Wilbur Larch and his apprentice Homer.

This novel is a failure from a author who previously gave such joy

In His Cider House Novel, Irving explored termination and identity with vibrancy, humor and an all-encompassing understanding. And it was a important work because it abandoned the subjects that were becoming annoying tics in his works: the sport of wrestling, wild bears, Vienna, prostitution.

This book begins in the fictional village of Penacook, New Hampshire in the twentieth century's dawn, where Thomas and Constance Winslow take in 14-year-old foundling the title character from St Cloud's home. We are a few generations before the action of The Cider House Rules, yet the doctor stays identifiable: even then dependent on ether, respected by his staff, opening every talk with “In this place...” But his appearance in Queen Esther is limited to these early scenes.

The family are concerned about raising Esther well: she’s from a Jewish background, and “how might they help a teenage Jewish female find herself?” To answer that, we move forward to Esther’s grown-up years in the twenties era. She will be part of the Jewish migration to the area, where she will become part of Haganah, the Zionist armed group whose “purpose was to safeguard Jewish communities from hostile actions” and which would subsequently establish the core of the Israel's military.

Those are huge themes to address, but having introduced them, Irving backs away. Because if it’s disappointing that this book is not actually about St Cloud's and Wilbur Larch, it’s even more disheartening that it’s also not really concerning the main character. For motivations that must connect to plot engineering, Esther becomes a substitute parent for another of the Winslows’ offspring, and delivers to a son, the boy, in World War II era – and the bulk of this novel is his narrative.

And at this point is where Irving’s preoccupations reappear loudly, both regular and distinct. Jimmy moves to – naturally – Vienna; there’s discussion of evading the Vietnam draft through self-mutilation (A Prayer for Owen Meany); a dog with a symbolic title (Hard Rain, meet Sorrow from The Hotel New Hampshire); as well as grappling, prostitutes, authors and male anatomy (Irving’s throughout).

Jimmy is a more mundane figure than the heroine hinted to be, and the minor characters, such as pupils Claude and Jolanda, and Jimmy’s tutor Annelies Eissler, are one-dimensional also. There are several nice scenes – Jimmy losing his virginity; a brawl where a couple of ruffians get battered with a support and a bicycle pump – but they’re brief.

Irving has never been a subtle writer, but that is not the difficulty. He has repeatedly repeated his arguments, hinted at story twists and let them to build up in the viewer's thoughts before taking them to completion in lengthy, surprising, funny scenes. For case, in Irving’s novels, anatomical features tend to be lost: think of the oral part in Garp, the hand part in Owen Meany. Those absences echo through the story. In the book, a major person suffers the loss of an limb – but we just discover 30 pages later the end.

She comes back toward the end in the story, but just with a eleventh-hour sense of concluding. We not once discover the full narrative of her life in Palestine and Israel. Queen Esther is a failure from a author who previously gave such pleasure. That’s the downside. The upside is that His Classic Novel – upon rereading together with this work – yet stands up excellently, 40 years on. So choose it as an alternative: it’s much longer as Queen Esther, but a dozen times as good.