“The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian” is a moving young-adult offering from Sherman Alexie. The story centers around Junior, a teen living in a Spokane Indian reservation who decides to chase a better life by leaving his tribal high school for a better (and all-white) school in a nearby town. His home community feels he’s betrayed them even as he struggles to fit into his new environment. You have all the familiar teen problems on top of that, with racism, poverty and marginalization thrown in the mix.

Alexie covers this ground with sympathy and humor, sharing a narrative that references his own upbringing. Even before he leaves the reservation Junior is an outcast, a frequent target for bullies due to some disabilities (seizures associated with “water on the brain” at birth) and general nerdiness. After a rocky start, his new community is more accepting, although tragedy and some well-timed cross-the-tracks basketball games lead Junior to wonder where his loyalties lie.

Adult readers aren’t the target audience for the book, and they may feel ahead of the class as Junior explain every facet of his problems, leaving few insights for the reader to discover. Some of the characters fall into stereotypes as well, notably the “nerd” at the new school, Gordon, who takes on that robotic, overelaborate way of speaking that marks geeks in popular culture.

But the book is still well crafted, which is no surprise, given Alexie’s talent. It offers a clear view into another culture and also a firsthand look at poverty and the crippling effects of alcoholism, which the author captures with a sharp, matter-of-fact bluntness. Many teen readers will benefit from the perspective, and adults will likely find something to value in the brisk read also.

A beautiful book. Lahiri’s decades-spanning tale centers on two brothers born in Calcutta around the time of partition. Both high achievers—and both very close—they nonetheless diverge as one, Subhash, heads to the United States for graduate school in oceanography and the other, Udayan, dedicates himself to the region’s violent Communist uprising.

The rest of the novel explores the repercussions of those decisions, both for the brothers themselves and the generations that follow. On the one hand, you have an immigrant’s tale of alienation and eventual accommodation, one that’s sensitively captured. Subhash falls in love with his new home, making a life for himself there that wouldn’t have been possible in the country of his birth. Udayan, in contrast, remains committed to India, falling in love with a self-destructive movement that promises to liberate it—and ends up being crushed instead.

Udayan falls in love with a woman as well, and it’s that relationship—and its entanglements—that end up driving the rest of the story. Lahiri uses the theme to explore guilt, repentance and above all the ongoing damage the past’s decisions can carry to the present day.

While the point of view varies, the bulk of the book centers on Subhash. That causes some problems; while he’s a likable character, he’s also a steady, conservative actor, and the narrative can drag a bit as we follow him through a series of responsible choices. I think the author wanted to place this honorable man and his choices in the spotlight, but while they shouldn’t pale in comparison to the revolutionary fervor of Udayan, they do.

A better balance between the two brothers might have made the book more propulsive. But it would also be a mistake to paint the brothers as equivalent, as Subhash is by far the more substantial of the two. Udayan is an idealist, but the outcomes of his actions, viewed through the long lens of “The Lowland’s” narrative, deserves the moral judgment that’s ultimately placed on him.

While some characters are more sympathetic than others, Lahiri is fair to all of them. She also captures the richness of her settings, both steaming Calcutta and cool Rhode Island. (California makes an appearance as well, but it’s more of a placeholder.)

Like Subhash, this novel is reserved in its pacing presentation. But spend enough time with it, and you see the unshakable core at its center.

This short novel is a nice little fable about a little boy who finds himself in some magical trouble. His parents own a ramshackle estate in England, one that they can’t quite afford to keep. Danger comes when a lodger arrives and starts a chain of events that draws mystical attention to the neighborhood, a kind of baffled intrusion by something very old from another world.

Fortunately, the three generations of women at the end of the lane, the youngest just a few years older than our narrator, come from that far place themselves, or somewhere near, at least, and have ways of dealing with the supernatural. They’ve become a bit cavalier in their power, though, and the girl takes the boy along for the ride and ends up setting loose the very trouble they’d hoped to bind.

The bulk of the book involves the boy trying to outwit this ghostly foe, finding a way to turn to his magic allies for help. At the same time, the struggle becomes an elaborate metaphor for adulthood. Gaiman explores the mysterious power that older folks hold in younger eyes as well as simultaneous realization that this aura of strength is just as much a facade as the faerie realm our narrator contends with.

Gaiman doesn’t seem to fully trust his reader’s ability to pick up this metaphor; he can be overexplicit in making his characters voice it. But while the subtext occasionally rises to become text, the story moves along propulsively, especially when our forces are set in opposition.

Gaiman’s narrator here isn’t always the most compelling voice; he’s a 7-year-old, unpopular, a reader, given to withdrawal and fantasy. At times he doesn’t sound much like a child, even one being filtered through the memory of his older self. But he’s ultimately resourceful enough to seek help and sturdy enough to make his move.

His allies, the Hempstocks, are nicely magical, filled with old-fashioned ways and even older abilities. They’re equally at ease with milking cows and exiling wayward spirits, although they don’t do anything as vulgar as cast spells. “Recipes” are the closest they come, its said, but they’re making magic nonetheless.

If you’ve read “Sandman” or any John Constantine, this world of faerie will feel familiar, but it’s still enjoyable. What it lacks in surprises it makes up for in comfort, even if our narrator’s plight is anything but comforting. Still, the Hempstocks stand by him, although at the end they seem to blame him for the trouble they exposed him to. That bit of characterization seems irresponsible, but maybe it’s just a case of the veil slipping, the gods revealing how they view humans.

“The Ocean at the End of the Lane” is a brisk read and an enjoyable one. It may not be Gaiman’s best work, but it’s not a bad place to see what he’s all about.