BOOKS: PLANET OF THE PROLIX APES

PETER HOEG'S NEW NOVEL IS AN UNFORTUNATE ODE TO WINDY MONKEYSHINES

Cynics may reflect: there is no forgiveness for the marvel who writes a brilliant, successful novel, one of those rare, resonant tales that every literate soul burns to read. On pain of universal outrage and derision, the marvel's next book and all succeeding ones must be even grander than the first, and, while precisely the same, also boldly and completely different. Reviewers, who are in charge of outrage and derision--as well as words like resonant--will pout like rejected lovers at anything short of incandescence.

And so it has gone for Danish novelist Peter Hoeg, who followed his brilliant thriller, Smilla's Sense...

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