If you do any sort of database programming, do yourself a favor and look at SQLAlchemy.

IMO, this is probably the greatest single piece of ORM/DB software I have ever used. Possibly the greatest overall. It answers every concern I've ever had with database programming. If you don't know Python, it's worth learning just to use SA.

1. Writing queries is a pain, especially Inserts/Updates.
SA's ORM is superb. That's all I can say. Selecting seemed a bit awkward at first, but it's fine now. Relations are a snap.

2. With an ORM, there's a lot of inefficiency. Sums for instance...
This is true. Fortunately, SA has an object-oriented expression language as well. It is very easy to understand and it is portable too.

3. Nothing beats raw SQL though.
That's ok, cause you can use raw SQL with SA just as easily as the expression language. But, I've found using SA's expression language is usually faster because you don't have to deal with bound parameters. Additionally, I have not come across something that absolutely had to be done in raw SQL. The expression language is very very functional.

4. Documentation
This is a big concern for me. I always need to find a way to do something and I usually don't want to go trolling through code to find it. SA has great documents. In depth tutorials with lots of examples. Everything I need.

So that's it for my reasons. Hopefully it will help others find SA and become as enamored with it as I have.