Dear Great Book Guru, I was at the Sea Cliff Beautification Garden Tour last week - it was fabulous! The organizers did their usual great job and the gardens were amazing. While on the tour, someone mentioned a debut novel that sounded very interesting - mysterious phenomena with comedic and religious implications. Thoughts?  Garden Goer

Dear Garden Goer, THE NIMBUS by Robert P. Baird is an intellectually challenging read and great fun at the same time. Adrian Bennett, a theology professor at a school modeled loosely on the University of Chicago School of Divinity, is startled to discover his two-year-old son Luca is glowing - a soft, pulsating, pink, blue, neon-like light that comes and goes unpredictably and becomes known as the nimbus.  Some can see this glow but others, including the boy’s mother Renata, cannot. Paul Harkins, a doctoral student in the department, is the first to notice the glow and finds himself becoming more and more enmeshed in the lives of the family.  Warren Kayita, an aging theology school dropout who now works as a librarian at the university is being pursued by a dangerous mobster because of ever growing debt but sees a way out of his predicament - the debt will be forgiven if he can arrange a meeting with the toddler.  Parenting, marriage roles, academic politics, religious beliefs are examined – many times with great humor but eventually all clash in a dramatic but satisfying conclusion, and we are left to consider: what is belief and what is the desire to believe?  Highly recommended!