Sometimes, the good write young

RAY ROBERTSON

SightseeingBy Rattawut LapcharoensapPenguin Canada, 247 pages, $28Traditionally, wisdom, technical expertise and most of the other virtues usually considered essential for the production of powerful, lasting art have been associated with experience and, by extension, age. There are exceptions -- rock stars, for instance, should never live past the age of 27, and only young poets who die early from the usual exuberant excesses of juvenility are permitted our uncompromised approval -- but for the most part, worldly and professional inexperience aren't considered vocational assets. Book publishers, however, consider them absolutely wonderful marketing tools, and there is little else that they enjoy more than trumpeting a writers' precociousness.