Book excerpt: TWO NOVELS ARE SET IN TURTLE BAY, an upscale neighborhood in midtown Manhattan east. In The Historian at Eventide, an eighty-five year old historian races to find the meaning (if any) of global history before he dies. During his two-year struggle, his quest becomes quixotic, and the various characters he deals with are either trying to save him or trying to steal all his money. In the end his quest proves futile and he gets swept up in the same human comedy that enfolds us all. In The Poet and the Sage, a newly-minted philosopher and true believer meets the philosopher Plotinus reincarnated. After joining his school, he falls in love with the Sage's landlady's daughter, and becomes a poet in lieu of going on a mystic flight to the One. The supporting cast includes a cat that thinks when it wants to, and several true believers who can't quite make it out of this imperfect world.