Is this really a surprise? Most ORM tools will add overhead to your application, they simply aren't capable of any real query optimization. Aside from the anonymous types, I'm not really sure there is any benefit here at all. Personally, I think your ADO.NET ExecuteQuery() is the easiest code to read. It also ensures that your object model evolves correctly, relying on an ORM to do this for you will inevitably lead to a spotty model.