Harry Mulisch
The Discovery of Heaven
Viking, $34.95

I know that we are living in the endtime and must be grateful for little triumphs in our literature. I know that the race of giants who wrote their books before the Flood has been washed away and that we must give praise now to lesser things But when America’s book reviewers acclaim a novel like Harry Mulisch’s The Discovery of Heaven as a major addition to Western literature, we have begun to settle for something lesser than we really need to.