NO WAY

A charming, wayward short novel achieved largely through letters. . .letters between fortyish Adriana who's been abandoned to Pascal's Pensees and her rabbits after the departure of her son, Michael; letters between his sister Angelica, dully married, and Michael -- who until he settles down with an English girl has been altogether irresponsible and unencumbered; and the further revelations of a young girl who has just had a baby which might have been Michael's. Author Ginzburg is too sophisticated to resolve anything in the va-et-vient of shifting relationships until Michael disappears for always -- killed in a student demonstration. The exchange is effected through brief, impromptu sentences which artfully snag your attention and also seize the day -- or rather the precarious suddenness, mobility and mortality of life.