Reddit Reddit reviews A Prayer for Owen Meany

We found 3 Reddit comments about A Prayer for Owen Meany. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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Christian Books & Bibles
Christian Literature & Fiction
A Prayer for Owen Meany
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3 Reddit comments about A Prayer for Owen Meany:

u/kmduncan · 7 pointsr/tipofmytongue

^ This! It's based on A Prayer for Owen Meany if you're interested in reading the book...I highly recommend it!

u/kimmature · 2 pointsr/truebooks

My 'favourite' novel seems to rotate amongst about 10 books, but if I could only read one novel for the rest of my life, it would be a A Prayer for Owen Meany. I don't even know how many times I've read it, but I still enjoy it (and get more out of it) every time.

Part of it is the characters. I like 'offbeat', and he certainly writes memorable, 'different' characters. But even though his characters are usually more than a little bit odd, they're also very human- they're not one-dimensional, but usually show something about the experience of life, and how to live it. Even when they're otherworldly (as Owen is, to a great extent), they are still firmly grounded in being human.

Themes- A lot of the themes are universal, and things that I've been thinking about for decades- sex, war, religion, fate, friendship, parenting, wealth, child/parent relationships, growing up, etc. One of the things that I love about the book is that as I've matured, I see different things in it. I think that I was in my early 20s when it was published- the way that I've thought about religion/love/sex/parenting has changed considerably over the years, and the novel has more than kept pace with that.

I've always been drawn to the religious aspect of it. Not just about the big questions (Owen as Christ figure, the pastors/priests in the book, pre-destination etc), but I've got a very strong connection to John Wheelwright's practice of his religion. Even though I've been an atheist for a long time, I grew up with the type of Anglicanism that he practices, and the forms and rituals are still very comfortable for me. Johnny could be any number of the 'neuter' older men that I would see in our church every week. And a good number of my friends went to Bishop Strachan, so there's that :-)

And while I've heard some younger readers say that the Vietnam aspect doesn't do anything for them, it's pretty integral to the novel for me. At that point (late 80s) there was a huge amount of Vietnam discussion going on where I live- not only constant new revelations about the war, but discussions about draft dodgers (in the late 80s in Canada there were questions/discussions going on about the draft dodgers who had come here from the U.S., as well as about govt. responsibility/transparency), and because it was the time that Reagan/Mulroney/Thatcher and their cronies were all going batshit crazy while still being extremely popular, a lot of the political/moral/military questions of the day were being asked through the filter of Vietnam, rather than head-on.

The humour- aside from all of the constant funny absurdities, the Nativity Play scene is one of the funniest things that I've ever read. It still puts me on the floor every time I read it.

The plotting. You don't really get the intricacies of the plot until the last few pages, where everything comes together brilliantly. It's a fun book just to sit down and read, but once you get to the end, you realize that there's not a wasted scene/event in the book- everything leads up to the last section. Even the parts that seemed extraneous or rambling lead directly to the last few pages- while I don't actually believe in predestination or fate, it's the one book that I always go back to if I want to believe for a while that everything happens for a reason.

u/Tall_for_a_Jockey · 1 pointr/Advice

Read this, then this. Social skills are skills. You have to practice them to get good at them. Most people suck at listening. Every loves Owen Meanty, even though he was smaller than you are. You are going to learn how to listen...how to like people, or your life is going to be surprisingly frustrating. A vous...