A Widow for One Year

About “A Widow for One Year”

One night when she was four, Ruth Cole woke to the sound of her parents making love. This moment opens John Irving's novel A Widow for One Year, which follows Ruth's life through three key periods. The story begins in 1958, when Ruth is four and living on Long Island. It then moves to 1990, when she is an unmarried woman with a successful literary career but a troubled personal life. The final section takes place in 1995, when Ruth is a forty-one-year-old widow and mother preparing to fall in love for the first time. The novel explores themes of love, grief, and time, blending humor with emotional depth.