BRIEFLY NOTED.(The Diviners)(Book Review)

The Diviners, by Rick Moody (Little, Brown; $25.95). Moody's latest novel revolves around a proposed mini-series epic that follows generations of a tribe of diviners, from the conquests of the Mongols to the founding of Las Vegas. Unbeknown to the agents and studio executives scrambling for the rights, there's no script, only a synopsis concocted by an office assistant and her lover, a married action-movie star. Meanwhile, a producer's aging alcoholic mother disappears; an accountant embezzles thousands of dollars and goes on the lam; and a schizophrenic bike messenger is falsely accused of attempted murder. Moody's kinetic prose calls to mind Bruce Wagner's kaleidoscopic Hollywood novels, but it lacks Wagner's acerbity and airy humor. One major riff concerns a popular television show about a community of werewolves (and involves a wearisome recounting of camera angles). Moody's novel, like the high-production-value shows it refers to, has an earnest sententiousness that overshadows its well-crafted fluency.

Here Is Where We Meet, by John Berger (Pantheon; $24). It is not always easy to tell, in the work of John Berger, where fiction meets autobiography--or, for that matter, essay and meditation. His latest book takes the form of encounters the author has with characters from the past--Jorge Luis Borges, Rosa Luxemburg, mentors, tutors, and lovers--in cities across Europe, from Lisbon and Madrid to Geneva and Krakow. One by one, the apparitions turn up, artfully and reverentially sketched, before vanishing again with just the whisper of a message left behind. In Lisbon, city of trams and azulejos, Berger encounters the spirit of his long-departed mother and reflects, "Perhaps Lisbon is a special stopover for the dead, perhaps here the dead show themselves off more than in any other city."

Bait and Switch, by Barbara Ehrenreich ...