"I have a narrative that makes some sort of sense of what happened." This sentence, taken from Carlo Gébler's memoir of his fraught relationship with his father, Father and I (2000), can be taken as a leitmotiv for his formidable body of novels: a catalogue of titles that has produced, out of the crosscurrents of intense personal feelings, family disorientation, and oppression, a study of the individual in the recent history of Europe and a powerful affirmation of the importance of the novel. Each of Gébler's books has been well reviewed and praised, though he still often receives the sort of critical attention--in terms of placement and length of reviews--accorded to "minor" novelists. Yet, critics have used such epithets as "hypnotic," "intriguing," and "compelling" to describe his novels. More important than these encomia, however, is the developing scope of his work as a whole. His...