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If some writers have an peak phase, in which they achieve the summit consistently, then American writer John Irving’s ran through a sequence of several substantial, rewarding works, from his 1978 hit His Garp Novel to 1989’s His Owen Meany Book. Such were rich, witty, big-hearted works, linking figures he calls “outliers” to cultural themes from gender equality to reproductive rights.

After His Owen Meany Novel, it’s been declining outcomes, save in size. His previous book, 2022’s The Chairlift Book, was nine hundred pages in length of topics Irving had delved into better in earlier books (inability to speak, restricted growth, gender identity), with a two-hundred-page film script in the center to extend it – as if padding were necessary.

Thus we approach a recent Irving with caution but still a faint glimmer of hope, which burns hotter when we learn that Queen Esther – a just 432 pages in length – “returns to the universe of The Cider House Rules”. That mid-eighties work is one of Irving’s very best books, taking place largely in an children's home in Maine's St Cloud’s, run by Wilbur Larch and his assistant Wells.

Queen Esther is a disappointment from a writer who in the past gave such joy

In The Cider House Rules, Irving explored abortion and acceptance with colour, wit and an all-encompassing understanding. And it was a important book because it moved past the topics that were turning into repetitive patterns in his works: the sport of wrestling, wild bears, Austrian capital, sex work.

Queen Esther starts in the fictional village of Penacook, New Hampshire in the twentieth century's dawn, where the Winslow couple adopt teenage foundling the title character from St Cloud’s. We are a few years before the action of Cider House, yet Dr Larch is still identifiable: already dependent on anesthetic, respected by his staff, starting every address with “At St Cloud's...” But his presence in this novel is limited to these initial scenes.

The couple fret about raising Esther correctly: she’s of Jewish faith, and “how might they help a young Jewish female discover her identity?” To tackle that, we flash forward to Esther’s grown-up years in the 1920s. She will be a member of the Jewish exodus to Palestine, where she will join the paramilitary group, the pro-Zionist armed group whose “purpose was to defend Jewish towns from hostile actions” and which would eventually form the core of the IDF.

Such are enormous themes to take on, but having presented them, Irving backs away. Because if it’s regrettable that Queen Esther is not really about St Cloud's and Wilbur Larch, it’s even more upsetting that it’s additionally not focused on the titular figure. For motivations that must relate to plot engineering, Esther ends up as a gestational carrier for one more of the Winslows’ offspring, and bears to a son, the boy, in the early forties – and the bulk of this story is Jimmy’s tale.

And here is where Irving’s fixations return strongly, both typical and distinct. Jimmy goes to – of course – the city; there’s talk of evading the draft notice through self-mutilation (Owen Meany); a canine with a symbolic title (Hard Rain, remember the earlier dog from His Hotel Novel); as well as the sport, sex workers, authors and penises (Irving’s throughout).

The character is a less interesting figure than the heroine suggested to be, and the minor players, such as pupils the pair, and Jimmy’s teacher Eissler, are underdeveloped also. There are several nice set pieces – Jimmy deflowering; a fight where a couple of bullies get battered with a support and a bicycle pump – but they’re short-lived.

Irving has not once been a delicate author, but that is is not the problem. He has always reiterated his ideas, foreshadowed plot developments and let them to build up in the viewer's mind before taking them to completion in lengthy, jarring, entertaining scenes. For case, in Irving’s works, body parts tend to be lost: think of the tongue in Garp, the hand part in Owen Meany. Those absences reverberate through the plot. In the book, a major character suffers the loss of an upper extremity – but we just find out 30 pages before the end.

The protagonist reappears late in the book, but only with a final feeling of ending the story. We never discover the entire account of her time in Palestine and Israel. This novel is a failure from a novelist who in the past gave such joy. That’s the downside. The positive note is that His Classic Novel – revisiting it in parallel to this work – yet stands up excellently, after forty years. So pick up it in its place: it’s twice as long as Queen Esther, but 12 times as enjoyable.