Paul Auster’s 2002 novel is whirlwind of storytelling, but may not be for every reader.

I’ve been a big fan of Auster every since I read his masterpiece, The New York Trilogy.  He’s a master storyteller, and I often feel like he’s just some portal to the world of stories and he can’t help it that they just pour out of him so easily.

The Book of Illusions is a fantastic return to the themes that recur throughout most of his work: identity, metafiction, and impending disaster.  The book is the story of a man who’s lost his wife and children in a plane crash.  He becomes interested in Hector Mann, a lost silent-era comedian, and decides to write a book on him to take his mind off of his lonely life.  Doing so drags him headlong into a bizarre mystery that has been going on since the early 1920’s, which brings him danger and romance…but not in a hokey spy novel way–in a completely breathtaking way.

As with all of Auster’s books, they are super-easy to read, just a breathless, straightforward style of storytelling; the key to Auster’s work, and the thing that makes him so exciting is that while it’s so quick and easy to read, there is an enormous amount of depth.  There are so many layers to this book, many of which intersect with Auster’s other works: David Zimmer meets Alga, who tells him about the life story of Hector Mann, who in turn is a storyteller in the form of a filmmaker, who’s films Zimmer views.  The film he sees is entitled The Inner Life of Martin Frost, which, in 2007, Auster himself turned into a real full-length film that he wrote and directed.  Confused yet?  Good.

Not really confusing, just mind-boggling that Auster has created such a fascinating pantheon of characters and stories in so many great books. But, I suppose, one could see the endless connections that are seemingly pointless as…well, pointless.  And I could see that that sort of thing could definitely get on someone’s nerves…if you’re not onto the whole thing.

Conclusion:

Check it out! Even if you don’t like it, don’t be put off by the length; it can easily be read in a weekend.

For fans of: Existentialism.  Kafka.  The art of storytelling.

You might not like this if: You don’t like subplots.  You’re not into the whole interconnectedness thing.

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