For me, it is not plot that is compelling, it is good writing, and Robert Schneider’s novel, The Guru’s Touch, is a beautifully crafted story. It is in many ways a page-turner, which is not to say that it is an “easy read” or that it lacks depth. Rather, it is a story in which the characters come to matter greatly to the reader, and the reader wants to know more. But characters come to matter only because of the writing with which they are created. The reader must marvel at Schneider’s writing. I found myself re-reading passages asking myself, How did he do that? The story is told in the style of a memoir, which gives almost every passage, every chapter, the quality of delicately managed irony. The narrator of this book is a solid, highly complex presence who speaks as no other writer I have ever read. This is a remarkable novel.
Thomas H. Ogden, author of the novels, The Parts Left Out and The Hands of Gravity and Chance.