SEWING CIRCLES

Marshall, a detached, slightly befuddled English professor at a New Hampshire college, is married to Sonja, a Realtor. McCallum, a colleague of Marshall's, is married to Sarah, newly pregnant. Cheryl, Marshall's student, flirting partner, and sort of mentee, is a roommate of McCallum's research assistant/lover, Livan. Tony, Sonja's boss, is also her lover. These are the threads of Ann Beattie's latest novel, ANOTHER YOU (Knopf, $24), and they weave round and round one another in an almost indiscriminate pattern -- though pattern it surely is. Certain events bring Marshall and McCallum together, and as each is forced into the problems of the other, Marshall is also forced to confront his own confusion, because there is a secret in his life that has made him whom he is, and he doesn't even know it (he only senses it). Nor does he ever learn it, although the reader does. And when that happens -- when it all falls into place -- the sense of peace is luminous. How many books, after all, can one happily close? A-

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