Best of 1991

FICTION

1 THE GOLD BUG VARIATIONS by Richard Powers.

Back in the late 1950s, Stuart Ressler was one of the eager young scientists trying to crack the genetic code of the DNA molecule. In the mid-'80s, he works the night shift for a computer billing outfit in Brooklyn. What brought Ressler to this dead-end job? That is only one of the questions posed and answered by this demanding, dazzling novel. Also on display are two love stories, two intertwined narratives, vast erudition and a white-knuckled, suspense-filled investigation into the meaning of life.

2. MATING by Norman Rush.

A down-on-her-luck American anthropologist in Botswana decides it is high time to find a spouse. Into her frame of reference comes Nelson Denoon, who is handsome, charismatic and doing worthy work for indigenous women in the Kalahari Desert. Her narrative of what happens next -- and next -- is both uproariously funny and deeply serious, a long courtship of highs and lows played against an exotic, meticulously described African landscape.

3. IMMORTALITY by Milan Kundera.

Out of a story about contemporary neuroses -- as displayed by four Parisians, two males and two females unhappy in interesting ways -- Kundera creates a free-form fictional context in which everything, including an imaginary conversation between Goethe and Ernest Hemingway, can be claimed to matter. The Czech author indulges his obsessive itch to tell all without ever turning out a dull or obfuscatory page.

4. A DANGEROUS WOMAN by Mary McGarry Morris.

The thirtysomething Martha Horgan makes an odd heroine, lacking, as she does, all the protective and intuitive senses society demands. Her job at the local dry cleaner is so comforting, compared to the rest of her daily experiences, that Martha often shows up on her day off. Morris triumphantly evokes the sad, vivid life of a character excluded, for reasons she cannot grasp, from the magic circle of friendship and family.

5. MAO II by Don DeLillo.

Will the overpopulated future offer any room or even sanction for the individual consciousness? Bill Gray, 63, a famously reclusive author, ponders this question as the outside world beckons him to go public. What awaits him there, as his dark imaginings foretell, are terrorists, those who have usurped the novelists' authority and now "make raids on human consciousness." This meeting is unforgettable, thanks to DeLillo's terse, electric dialogue and descriptive passages of insidious beauty.

LESSER MOMENTS IN PUBLISHING I

Most disarming self-critique by the author of a runaway best seller: "Margaret Mitchell is a better writer. But she's dead."

Alexandra Ripley, author of Scarlett

Most depressing final words in a novel of more than 1,300 pages: "To be continued."

Norman Mailer, Harlot's Ghost

Most welcome final words in a gory thriller of nearly 800 pages: "Killed enough?" Ryan slid the sword back into its sheath and let it fall to his side. "Yes, Your Highness. I think we all have."

Tom Clancy, The Sum of All Fears