"A Widow for One Year" by John Irving

I am in developing countries for eleven days with no gastrointestinal issues. I am back in the US for one full day, and I get food poisoning.

When I wasn't listening to the tv, on the couch in the fetal position, I was finishing "A Widow for One Year". Irving's books are unlike anything else--so rich and full and the stories skip along at such a lively pace that you feel completely sunken into another world.

The protagonist in "A Widow for One Year" is a literary writer, and at one point she's plotting her next novel. Of course I wondered if her method is how Irving crafts his stories. There's an interview with Irving at the end of my edition of this book, and after reading it I think their processes probably are similar. Although I still have no idea how he composes such foie-gras-fed stories.

Also in the interview, Irving address criticism that he's a sentimentalist. Who knew Amsterdam prostitutes, abortion, Vietnam, or feminism were sentimental concerns? They're just the stuff of freaking good stories.