I just this minute finished reading this book. I have never read anything by Irving. I am familiar with some of his books but know nothing about any of them. This particular book has recently received some glowing reviews from some of my GR friends and since I trust their judgment and have been looking for new books to read I picked up a copy. As I read this book I could understand how it could captivate a reader and could garner such rave reviews. I too was initially charmed by the book, its story, and its tone but then the author lost me. I thought the author had never learned that there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. Reading this book became an experience like listening to a dynamic orator that doesn't know when to shut up. I was sure that this would be a three star review, tops. I kept reading.The book is about two boys, 11 years old when the story starts, that grow up together in a small New Hampshire town. The story narrator is John Wheelwright and his friend is the titled character, Owen Meany. Most of the first half of the book takes place in the 1950's and primarily in 1953. One would have a hard time not being charmed by the antics of 2 11 year old boys in this last era of American quaintness in an all American small town community. I know I was taken by it. But then the author launches into his story and the mysteries and questions arise and I was further intrigued but did I mention the book is 543 pages long and there are only 9 chapters? I started with mild annoyance that went to irritation, and settled on aggravation. Irving is an excellent writer. I was certain there was a 5 star story in this book but he buried it under a mountain of unnecessary and excessive verbage.I understand that it is necessary to include a certain amount of detail to a story's surroundings and to include develop extraneous characters. The purpose of such detail is to color the geographical, social, and emotional landscape that these 2 boys exist in. I can accept that but what the author included in this book exceeded what I considered reasonable. I thought 100 or more pages could easily have been edited from this book not only without harming it but actually improving it. The story would have read more easily and been easier to understand. So the more I read the more irritated I became primarily because I knew the book and its challenging message were very good and the reader was being distracted by almost constant inclusion of trivial scenes and superfluous characters. I wondered if Irving was being paid by the word. Now don't get me wrong all of this unnecessary material was very well written and even entertaining at times but it delayed the telling of the main story in my mind. This is what I meant by too much of a good thing. Why?Well the story is John reminiscing about his life with his best and closest friend Owen Meany. John is recapping his life from Toronto, Canada in 1987 where he now lives and teaches at a local girl's prep school. In 1953 John's single mother is killed by being hit with a foul ball at a Little League game. The batter was Owen Meany. Of course it was an accident but this incident sets in motion a closeness to the relationship between John and Owen that was even greater than they had before the accident. The religious overtones in the story may seem excessive and might be off-putting for some but it is all part of the author's purpose. I got hooked into the questions being raised in the story but kept being annoyed by all the distracting side stories and characters. I didn't care about them. I wanted to know about John and Owen and John's mom and who John's father might be. I had lost patience with all this fluff material and my 3 star review was forming in my mind. I don't want to say much more about the plot of the book except by the time I got to the end I think I had an epiphany.From the biographical material included in the book jacket it would appear that there is more than a casual similarity between the setting of this book and the life of John Irving. I am going to guess that this book may be a highly personal work for the author and may be based on real people in the author's life. Just a guess on my part. Further, the writing is really good so why would such a talent bury his message under all these unnecessary pages? This made no sense as surely the author knew what he was doing. Then it was the way Irving brought so much of this "unnecessary" material to relevance at the end. There had to be method to this wordiness. I thought about it from a different angle. I put myself in the character of the adult John. If I were reminiscing about my boyhood, my youth, the time I spent with the best friend I ever had would my telling of these times be brief? If I were a friend of adult John's and I knew he was talking about such a friend and that friend was dead and John was obviously grieving would I not sit and listen no matter how long the story lasted? Of course such a telling would meander, it would include all sorts of suddenly remembered people, places, and events and in no special order of time or place. I had wondered if the author, given the religious aspect of the story, was challenging the reader to undergo an ordeal in order to discover the challenge and message of his story. That might have been part of it but I think John needed a friend to tell his story to and the friend could take from the story whatever he wanted. This friend is glad he kept his mouth shut and the story could be told any way John wanted to tell it.