The 158-Pound Marriage (Ballantine Reader's Circle)
by John Irving
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Book Summary Information
Author: John IrvingEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1997-06-23
ISBN: 0345417968
Number of pages: 176
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of The 158-Pound Marriage (Ballantine Reader's Circle)
Book Review: Its heartfelt erosion of social boundary
Summary: 5 Stars
I was reading The Copuple by John updike, (who according to some has always written 'salacious literature')and came to know that what he did for the couples of entire town is done here by Irving between two couples and hence the lust, love, jealousy and emotion is much more potent and colourfull.
its like the enhanced colour of suburbs when you see it after the rain with dark snaky slippery wet road. The plot starts with the introduction of Utchka the wife of a history book writer and before you realise you see that its the menage a quatre that is taking hold of your heart and groin.
Four of them are enjoying ultiple love session with each other and going on well till they realise that one of them the wrestler and germa teacher of the other couple is not enjoying the idea of the other gulible man ejoying his coy wife more than he enjoys utchka the rustic but solidly built wife of narator.
He being an wrestler who does everything out of his provess and amicable easygoing charm....is not easy when his coy want-to-be-writer wife gets more than physical...(ironically) that is personal...he starts...taking control of everything and everybody...taking to finale which is really felt by the reader who have started fantasizing about whole thing.....and have started liking too...since everyone can not get engaged in this kind of relation..
Though i had read long back a short story by Roald Dahl "Switch Bitch" on the same theme...the ferile imagination of Irwing has made this whole thing so acceptable.....
Read and enjoy it if you can not indulge...go for The Couples by Updike too...
Summary of The 158-Pound Marriage (Ballantine Reader's Circle)
The darker vision and sexual ambiguities of this erotic, ironic tale about a ménage a quatre in a New England university town foreshadow those of The World According to Garp; but this very trim and precise novel is a marked departure from the author's generally robust, boisterous style. Though Mr. Irving's cool eye spares none of his foursome, he writes with genuine compassion for the sexual tests and illusions they perpetrate on each other; but the sexual intrigue between them demonstrates how even the kind can be ungenerous, and even the well-intentioned, destructive.Literary Books
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