Colm Toibin's body of work is so impressive and wide ranging that he has transcended the title of mere "author." Aside from brilliant fiction such as his recent biographical novel of Henry James ("The Master") and "The Blackwater Lightship," Toibin has also written or edited anthologies of Irish fiction,revisionist explorations of the Irish famine and a meditation on the state of Catholicism in Europe. Toibin returns to fiction with his latest book "Mothers and Sons," but he is still trying something different. This time he has written a collection of short stories. The title outlines the main theme of Toibin's stories, though there is great diversity of character, form, language, even length in this collection. In "The Use of Reason," a lifelong criminal is nearly exposed by his own mother, while "A Priest in the Family" can be seen as a morality tale involving child abuse and Mother Ireland. ($24 / 288 pages / Scribner)