It is about time that Irish writer John Banville received some widespread acclaim. In October 2005, Banville won the prestigious and lucrative Man Booker Prize for his novel "The Sea," which was published earlier this year in the United Kingdom. Now, it has been released in the U.S. For years, Banville has been something of a "writer's writer," a master prose stylist whose 14 novels are also deeply intellectual. Now that Banville has won the Booker, hopefully more readers will see that Banville's sometimes demanding work is worth the effort. Banville's latest novel revolves around a widower named Max who returns to a locale where he spent an eventful vacation decades earlier. In many of Banville's past works, he explores the question of identity by presenting us a pair of doubles - in the case of "The Sea," a mysterious set of twins named Myles and Chloe. It is not long before Max is drawn into a disturbing relationship with the duo, one which may help (or make it impossible for him) to reconcile himself with the past. "The Sea" is shorter than some of Banville's past novels. All the more reason for uncertain readers to pick up Banville and see what a genius he really is. ($23 / 208 pages / Knopf)