The Nature of Things

This book about a bisexual man and his multitudinous and varied sexual liaisons contains many of the themes of a John Irving novel - wrestling, the missing father, mentions of bears, and unconventional sex. Over the years, in his writing, Irving has explored human sexuality in all its many expressions and, here, he brings all those themes full circle as he asks his readers to accept that all of those expressions are legitimate and are merely a part of the human experience. Of all the Irving books I've read, this one reminded me most of The World According to Garp in its delineation of Irving's favorite themes. As the narrator of this story, Irving gives us William Abbott, Bill or Billy to most of his friends. This is Bill's story. He had grown up in a small Vermont town where sexual repression seemed a way of life. He attended a local all-boys school where all the boys - at least all the ones we get to know - seemed to be homosexual. Moreover, the town had a librarian, Mis...