THE ROSIE PROJECT by Graeme Simsion. This was the #1 pick on the October Indie Next list - a warm and funny romantic tale that booksellers are recommending left and right. I happily read it in two sittings.

Don Tillman is an order-obsessed (read anal) brainiac, a geneticist and science professor who, although interested, is a total flop with women. Think Big Bang Theory's Sheldon Cooper with an actual libido. When a friend asserts he'd make a wonderful husband nonetheless, he embarks on a search for a suitable mate. Not using match.com, mind you, but by creating The Wife Project and embarking on a scientific search for the perfect partner.

And then he meets Rosie, who fits none of Don's criteria but is intelligent and attractive in spite of her spontaneity and other obvious "flaws." She's on the hunt for her biological father, and who better than a DNA expert to help? So scientist Don drops The Wife Project and takes on The Father Project, which means more time spent with Rosie. As might be expected, an unlikely relationship develops and the reader is the beneficiary.

THE GOLDFINCH by Donna Tartt. It's pretty amazing that Tartt has developed such a fervent following, given that she has only written three novels - each one written 10 years apart. The Secret History was an extraordinary debut back in 1992, and The Little Friend, while not as well reviewed, still sold well when it was published in 2002.

Now, in her much-anticipated latest novel, her protagonist is young Theo, who early on survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, he lives with a friend's family in New York, where his obsession with a small painting that reminds him of his mother leads him to the art underworld. There is much more, of course - at nearly 800 pages, The Goldfinch is both figuratively and literally a weighty book. In a recent review in The New York Times Book Review, Stephen King (yes, that one) called it "a rarity that comes along perhaps half a dozen times per decade, a smartly written literary novel that connects with the heart as well as the mind..."