Books we like ... and books we're not too fussed about
Paul Auster
Faber and Faber 2010
Paul Auster’s latest novel is odd because it’s not odd at all. No clever post-modern tricks, no character stepping out of the story into another, no footnote digressions. Instead it’s a fairly conventional account of a number of different lives told from the characters’ perspectives. Miles is the central one; after accidentally being the cause of his stepbrother’s death he has cut himself off from New York and his family. The novel tells the story of his return. With an old acquaintance he moves into a squat, in the eponymous Sunset Park; there we meet the other occupants: an artist who makes erotic drawings, and a student researching The Best Years Of Our Lives. There’s also his mother, an actress, and his father, the owner of a failing independent publisher. In fact the whole novel is set against a background of economic crisis – although no-one seems particularly short of money. Auster as always makes the story engrossing and tells it well; it’s just by the end I couldn’t resist a momentary “So what?”
1 March 2011
http://www.stuartpilkington.co.uk/paulauster/
See also: Invisible The Brooklyn Follies Man in the Dark
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