In this wacky, wonderful and witty British comedy of manners, award-winning writer Jane Gardam has assembled a memorable cast of characters certain to delight.

Faith Fox, of the title, is a motherless infant who assumes no personal identity but whose presence and need for care ignite the novel's quirky stream of events.

Her father, Andrew, an emotionally remote physician still grieving for his wife, doesn't even like children. Her socially prominent maternal grandmother, Thomasina, denies both her daughter's death and Faith's existence by fleeing to Egypt with a retired general whom she met at a health farm.

Faith's paternal grandparents, Dolly and Toot, live in rural Yorkshire, are elderly and infirm, and teeter between being merely cantankerous and lovingly dotty.

Yet, someone must care for Faith, so Thomasina's London friend Pammie takes the infant to Andrew's clergyman brother Jack in Yorkshire.

At this point, Gardam is in full glory as she lets London privilege meet Yorkshire hardiness. She introduces us to Jack's eccentric quasi-religious commune, consisting of Tibetan refugees, ex-burglars and a dour cook/housekeeper called The Missus. A stalwart Church of England activist, Pammie turns her initial shock at Jack's ill-assorted "community of unloved" into a mental dramatic monologue to share with her London friends.

Through Pammie's eyes, we also see Jack's small, silent Indian wife Jocasta and her 11-year-old son Philip (father unknown), who is mostly ignored, but wisely observant and devoted to Faith.

Lest readers tire of the haphazard life here, Gardam also frolics through the lives of Thomasina, Pammie, Thomasina's retired general and Madeleine, a delightfully eccentric World War II flame of the general's whose grasp of time rapidly shifts precariously between the 1990s and 1940s.

Adroitly, Gardam brings everyone together - or almost together - in a Christmas madcap adventure. Yet, just as we think it's all over, she throws us a surprise ending that's warmly affirming.

Faith Fox, which has overtones of Fay Weldon's writings (but less acerbic) should be snatched by the comedy producers from the BBC. If they overlook this delightful gem, they're a right daft bunch.

Joan Hinkemeyer is a Denver librarian and free-lance writer.