Roger's Version starts out with both barrels blazing, presenting two opposing sides (each persuading and well-constructed in its own right) of a God-vs-science argument between Roger, a jaded divinity professor, and Dale, a brash young grant candidate at his university. However, the book begins to bog down as outside forces in the characters' lives begin to chip away at Dale's once-unassailable beliefs and Roger's self-assured perceptions of moral superiority.
Like a lot of Updike's work, the book explores dark regions of the male sexual identity, venturing into cringe-inducing seediness at times (like Philip Roth, Updike often gives the disturbing impression that the c-word once enjoyed a decades-long run of dominance as the euphamism of choice for female genitalia).
The pacing of the book is appropriate, given the increasing complexity of the subject matter as the narrative moves forward. As the characters' beliefs and self-identities are alloyed through trying personal experiences, the prose becomes less clear and my reading slowed over the course of the book from an exhilirating sprint in the first 100 pages to a crawl through mud in the last 80 or so. While that may not make for an aesthetically enjoyable read, it's a rewarding allegory for how the more we learn about ourselves and our world, the more unclear our search for existential answers becomes.