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If certain writers enjoy an peak phase, in which they achieve the heights consistently, then American writer John Irving’s ran through a sequence of several long, rewarding books, from his late-seventies hit Garp to 1989’s A Prayer for Owen Meany. These were generous, witty, big-hearted novels, connecting characters he refers to as “outliers” to cultural themes from feminism to reproductive rights.

Following A Prayer for Owen Meany, it’s been declining returns, save in page length. His most recent novel, the 2022 release The Last Chairlift, was 900 pages long of themes Irving had explored more skillfully in earlier books (selective mutism, short stature, transgenderism), with a two-hundred-page screenplay in the heart to fill it out – as if extra material were needed.

Thus we come to a new Irving with reservation but still a small glimmer of hope, which shines stronger when we learn that Queen Esther – a just 432 pages – “returns to the universe of The Cider House Rules”. That mid-eighties book is one of Irving’s top-tier novels, taking place largely in an orphanage in the town of St Cloud’s, operated by Wilbur Larch and his protege Homer Wells.

Queen Esther is a letdown from a novelist who in the past gave such joy

In The Cider House Rules, Irving explored termination and acceptance with richness, humor and an comprehensive compassion. And it was a significant novel because it left behind the topics that were evolving into repetitive habits in his works: wrestling, bears, the city of Vienna, prostitution.

Queen Esther opens in the fictional town of New Hampshire's Penacook in the early 20th century, where the Winslow couple welcome teenage orphan the protagonist from St Cloud’s. We are a a number of years prior to the storyline of The Cider House Rules, yet Dr Larch is still recognisable: already addicted to ether, respected by his staff, opening every address with “In this place...” But his role in this novel is limited to these initial scenes.

The couple fret about bringing up Esther well: she’s of Jewish faith, and “how could they help a adolescent Jewish girl understand her place?” To answer that, we move forward to Esther’s adulthood in the Roaring Twenties. She will be part of the Jewish migration to Palestine, where she will become part of the Haganah, the Zionist armed group whose “mission was to protect Jewish settlements from opposition” and which would eventually establish the foundation of the Israeli Defense Forces.

Those are massive topics to take on, but having brought in them, Irving dodges out. Because if it’s frustrating that this book is hardly about the orphanage and Dr Larch, it’s still more disappointing that it’s also not really concerning Esther. For motivations that must connect to story mechanics, Esther turns into a substitute parent for one more of the Winslows’ daughters, and gives birth to a baby boy, James, in World War II era – and the majority of this story is the boy's story.

And at this point is where Irving’s preoccupations come roaring back, both common and distinct. Jimmy relocates to – of course – the city; there’s talk of avoiding the Vietnam draft through bodily injury (A Prayer for Owen Meany); a canine with a symbolic designation (the dog's name, recall the earlier dog from His Hotel Novel); as well as the sport, prostitutes, writers and genitalia (Irving’s passim).

The character is a less interesting character than the heroine suggested to be, and the supporting characters, such as pupils the two students, and Jimmy’s tutor Annelies Eissler, are flat too. There are a few enjoyable scenes – Jimmy his first sexual experience; a fight where a couple of bullies get battered with a crutch and a air pump – but they’re brief.

Irving has never been a subtle novelist, but that is is not the problem. He has repeatedly restated his points, foreshadowed plot developments and let them to accumulate in the audience's imagination before taking them to resolution in long, surprising, amusing sequences. For case, in Irving’s books, body parts tend to disappear: recall the tongue in The Garp Novel, the finger in His Owen Book. Those missing pieces echo through the narrative. In the book, a central person suffers the loss of an upper extremity – but we only discover 30 pages the conclusion.

Esther comes back late in the story, but merely with a eleventh-hour impression of ending the story. We never discover the complete story of her time in Palestine and Israel. This novel is a letdown from a novelist who once gave such pleasure. That’s the downside. The upside is that The Cider House Rules – revisiting it together with this book – even now holds up beautifully, after forty years. So choose that in its place: it’s twice as long as Queen Esther, but 12 times as great.