Novelists: the soul of an age, certainly. Brilliant? Perhaps. Yet aren't they also doddering, petulant, pedantic, knockkneed, skittish, and thunderingly insecure-resentful, awkward, annoying-demanding, deluded, and vexingly indifferent to reality? New from short fiction devotÔee C.P. Boyko, Novelists is a comedy of manners (and manuscripts), rivaling Vanity Fair for its satirical wit . . . though not, mercifully, for its length.