For another view of the book I rave about below, there is Ms. Kakutani's semi-dissent, which I don't buy at all; in fact, I thought Yezad's "sudden metamorphosis" from "Westernized skeptic to spiritual zealot" was "persuasively dramatized by Mr. Mistry," mainly because he set it up so gradually and smoothly; Yezad enters the fire-temple almost on a whim and stays because the ceremony, the world, the dustoorji (Zoroastrian priest) all connect to something real and solid in his life and in his past, and she seems to forget that there's some lapse of time between him being a convert and a fanatic.

Maybe, possibly, she has a point that the "two horrific tragedies -- each involving a pair of violent deaths -- that bookend Nariman's life are clumsily handled," although it didn't strike me quite that way while I was reading it.

Anyway -- you probably haven't read the book and you can't really follow my thoughts, but listen to me, people: Family Matters is a fantastically absorbing novel.