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Outstanding
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The Globe And Mail [Toronto] Robert J. Wiersema
Perhaps his finest book. The novel stands on its own as powerfully intimate, epic storytelling, but serves also as a summation, and a re-evaluation, of Irving's canon. [23 Jul 2005, p.D6]
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Favorable
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The Onion A.V. Club Tasha Robinson
For all its probing into the depth of one life, Until I Find You is a relatively surface-level book. But it's a very rich surface.
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Favorable
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San Francisco Chronicle Alan Cheuse
If the story... had been a third or even twice again as long, I would have stayed with it.
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Favorable
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Publishers Weekly
Though the incessant, graphic sexual abuse becomes gratuitous, Irving handles the novel's less seedy elements superbly. [6 Jun 2005, p.36]
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Favorable
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Chicago Sun-Times Sharon Barrett
This is a wonderfully thought-provoking book.
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Favorable
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The Guardian Elena Seymenliyska
So what if Jack isn't a very compelling hero or that the book is a challenging 822 pages, stretching ahead seemingly without end?... After the slim pickings of The Fourth Hand, Irving's previous novel, Until I Find You is a feast for his fans.
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Favorable
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TLS: The Times Literary Supplement Chris Moss
In its details, the novel can be irritating.... But in its broader vision, Until I Find You is a powerful, occasionally beautiful work and none of its difficulties is incidental.
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Mixed
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Village Voice Benjamin Strong
Until I Find You may stymie the reader with its own tactics of emotional distancing.
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Mixed
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The Independent Mary Flanagan
At its best, it is wonderfully sustained and very funny, full of riffs and by-ways, synopses of imaginary novels and screenplays, extended quotes from poetry and song. But this can also be trying
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Mixed
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Daily Telegraph David Robson
At 820 pages, the novel is absurdly long.... But its gentle, perplexed hero, with his lost-boy innocence, lodges in the memory.
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Mixed
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Chicago Tribune Carol Anshaw
All along its way, the narrative lurches like a sewing machine, zipping along at a rapid clip, then suddenly slowing to take a corner, too often for not enough reason. [10 Jul 2005]
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Mixed
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Entertainment Weekly Benjamin Svetkey
The book's second half is so much more lively, you can't help but wish Irving had packed even bigger chunks of Hollywood into this jumbo volume.
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Mixed
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Los Angeles Times Heller McAlpin
"Until I Find You," an often stunningly visual novel, is burdened by bloat. [10 Jul 2005]
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Mixed
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USA Today Bob Minzesheimer
There are some brilliant and hilarious passages, but a big problem too: It's hard to get emotionally invested in movie star Jack Burns who, for much of the novel, is acting more than living.
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Unfavorable
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New York Observer Nan Goldberg
It occurs to me that with some really sharp editing (are you listening, Random House?), there may be two very satisfactory novels to be had here instead of one borderline awful one. [18 Jul 2005, p.21]
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Unfavorable
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The New York Times Book Review Paul Gray
An immensely protracted story devoid of any conflict.
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Unfavorable
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Slate April Bernard
A dreadful, though clearly heartfelt, mess.... Even by Irving's own standards, this novel is sloppy and long.
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Unfavorable
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The Observer Adam Mars-Jones
Dickensian character-drawing is supposed to be larger than life, not just longer.
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Unfavorable
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The New Yorker
It quickly becomes bogged down by unnecessary detail.
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Unfavorable
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Daily Telegraph Benjamin Markovits
In spite of these faults, the novel almost manages, until the end, to take on a deeper significance. Thoroughness does have its power.
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Unfavorable
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The Independent Christian House
A flabby belly-flop of a book.
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Terrible
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The New York Times Michiko Kakutani
A tedious, self-indulgent and cruelly eye-glazing read.
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Terrible
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Washington Post Marianne Wiggins
The story reads as if Irving woke from a recurring nightmare and started dictating compulsively. He's too good a journeyman to have written anything this bad on purpose, and I kept asking myself, "What's he up to? How's he going to salvage this?"
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Terrible
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Kirkus Reviews
Is this Irving's worst novel? No doubt about it. [1 May 2005, p.497]
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Terrible
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Boston Globe Kurt Jensen
One senses Irving's attempt to achieve comic effect with such human oddities, and to some extent he succeeds. Yet there is nothing interestingly funny -- much less comically smart -- about any of it. The literary effect is one of extraordinary aesthetic banality.
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