Appropriately enough for a book about math, Gifted is more than the sum of its parts. It is the story of a math prodigy, a coming-of-age novel, and a look at immigrant life. But it all comes together in a way that is so interesting, so satisfying, that it is a truly great novel of general appeal.

The heroine, Rumi Vasi, is the “gifted” young daughter of Indian parents living in Wales. Driven by her parents to excel in mathematics, Rumi achieves their highest hope for her – acceptance at Oxford University when she is 15. Lalwani masterfully captures the awkwardness and inner turmoil of this out-of-place adolescent.

Lawani’s writing is remarkably polished for a first novel. Her language does not get in the way of the story, either by being distractingly beautiful or stumblingly clunky. The words flow so naturally you do not notice them, allowing the story to unfold with natural grace, right up to the suitably dramatic ending with its hope of positive resolution.

Dance it 12 short novels in a series, all about the same characters living in England between WWI and post-WWII. Dense, but fantastic. Thinking of it as one, long book, it deserves a very high ranking on any list of recommended literature.

The Shell Seekers is a plot-driven family saga centered around Penelope Sterne, daughter of an artist and mother of three unlikable adult children (well, two are outright unlikable; one is supposed to be admirable but is singularly off-putting). Penelope, now 64 and suffering from a weak ticker, putters in her English garden, ponders her past, and considers how and when to dispose of the few of her father’s now-valuable art works in her possession.

The story moves right along at a bracing clip, through lengthy detours into Penelope’s childhood in Cornwall, Britain’s WWII home front, and the younger daughter’s sojourn in Ibiza. It is an enjoyable read, well-deserving of it’s decades of popularity. Only in retrospect does the novel disappoint.

The main weakness is a lack of character development. The characters spring fully-formed onto the page. The “good” people are all generous, hard-working, independent, and bluntly forthright. (They are also startlingly unsentimental.) The “bad” folks are greedy, vain, self-centered, and silly. None of them change, either individually or in relation to the others. When the narrative reaches its chronologically natural ending, resolution of the various threads is brusquely efficient, but not convincing or satisfying.

Overall, it is an entertaining but unfulfilling read.

Following the death of his wife, the widowed narrator of The Sea spends a lengthy recuperative and reflective stay at the same beach town where he vacationed as a child. The story goes back and forth between his present grief and his coming-of-age memories.

Banville has a graceful way of turning a phrase and more than a few clever lines (“If there was such a thing a ‘long shrift,’ I was in need of some” and “He was half way to a half wit” for example). The present-day story of the wife’s death is particularly touching. The childhood story is charming, although the end did not work as well, in retrospect, as it seemed to. All in all, an entertaining read.

Only Henry James can take a beguiling idea like quasi-incestuous adultery, add an Italian prince, a billionaire art collector, and exotic foreign travel, and make a story so tedious that it is a true chore to read.

James writes in wisps of ideas, continually layering these wisps until there is a shimmery, translucent image that gives an idea of what he is trying to get at. These literary holograms are sometimes pretty, often interesting up to a point, but there is no substance to them. By the time the image emerges from the wisps, all I can think is, “So what?”

I can appreciate the talent it took to write an entire novel without saying anything directly. James definitely had a skill that he developed to the utmost. But while I admire the talent, I have no desire to make it a part of my life. I appreciate James’s talent the way I appreciate that of the artists who can paint the face of Jesus on a grain of rice. Impressive, but I’m not going to collect a gallery of rice portraits.

Only Henry James can take a beguiling idea like quasi-incestuous adultery, add an Italian prince, a billionaire art collector, and exotic foreign travel, and make a story so tedious that it is a true chore to read.

James writes in wisps of ideas, continually layering these wisps until there is a shimmery, translucent image that gives an idea of what he is trying to get at. These literary holograms are sometimes pretty, often interesting up to a point, but there is no substance to them. By the time the image emerges from the wisps, all I can think is, “So what?”

I can appreciate the talent it took to write an entire novel without saying anything directly. James definitely had a skill that he developed to the utmost. But while I admire the talent, I have no desire to make it a part of my life. I appreciate James’s talent the way I appreciate that of the artists who can paint the face of Jesus on a grain of rice. Impressive, but I’m not going to collect a gallery of rice portraits.

Portrait is certainly more accessible than Ulysses or Finnegans Wake, but it lacks the delightful wordplay and zany, ambitious flights that leave the reader in wonderment. It has its obscure parts, but for the most part chronicles Stephen Dedalus’s life from young childhood through college, recording everything that influenced him.

Some of these influences were recorded in more meticulous detail than makes for entertainment. For instance, the long, long passage giving the priest’s sermon on sin and Hell was a flawless rendition of a classic fire and brimstone harangue. To describe it is to describe the problem with it.

I thought I had read this in college, but listening to the audio version made me wonder. If I did read it, I deserved a very bad grade for comprehension and retention.

This is a mystery and a morality play and a historical novel all rolled into one.

In 1630, John Brigge is the coroner and one of the Governors in an unnamed Northern England town. When he is called into town from his family and farm on the other side of the desolate moor, he finds not only a woman accused of murdering her newborn son, but political upheaval as law-and-order extremists use fiery oratory and public torture to consolidate their power.

There are times when the implicit comparison to modern times is a little heavy handed, but, in general, the author avoids preaching by focusing on human ambiguity rather than human hypocrisy. Whether the final ending is heard-heartedly cynical or comfortingly realistic is up for debate.

This Pulitzer winner is the story of the Roby family of Empire Falls, Maine, primarily from the point of view of the recently-divorced Miles Roby. Miles struggles to make a go of the Empire Grill, get out from under the thumb of the town doyenne, maintain his relationship with his teen age daughter, settle a feud with a local cop, understand his parents, and overcome his fear of heights so he can paint the church steeple.

It is an engrossing, meaty read. It is a great, old-fashioned yarn, by which I mean it has a strong, coherent plot; fully-developed characters; drama; a reasonable tempo; and more than a few thought-provoking ideas. Thoroughly entertaining.

This Pulitzer winner is the story of the Roby family of Empire Falls, Maine, primarily from the point of view of the recently-divorced Miles Roby. Miles struggles to make a go of the Empire Grill, get out from under the thumb of the town doyenne, maintain his relationship with his teen age daughter, settle a feud with a local cop, understand his parents, and overcome his fear of heights so he can paint the church steeple.

It is an engrossing, meaty read. It is a great, old-fashioned yarn, by which I mean it has a strong, coherent plot; fully-developed characters; drama; a reasonable tempo; and more than a few thought-provoking ideas. Thoroughly entertaining.