The Book of Illusions was the first book I read by Paul Auster in a long time. While reading through David Zimmer’s past, you will think about death, family, hope, love, art and many more; You will gain a pleasant perspective on how to deal with loss.
The Book of Illusions begins with David Zimmer, who lost his wife and two children in a plane crash, telling how he slowly destroyed himself with alcohol and depression. Like him, your hands are tied, and you turn the pages sadly. Then suddenly and unexpectedly, David meets someone who makes himself laugh: Hector Mann. While watching a documentary about Hector Mann on TV, David realises that he is laughing at Mann’s short films.
As well as being funny, Hector Mann is a very mysterious actor because he disappeared for no apparent reason.
Some think that the actor was killed and others think he made a living in a different country with completely different jobs, but nobody has any idea what it is. Instead of killing himself slowly, David pursues Hector Mann movies; now he has something to do. After watching the films, David writes a book about them, and then he gets an interesting letter.
What happens after this letter will completely change David’s life. This is a book that keeps people curious with its characters, subject and fluent language. If you like Paul Auster, I’m sure you’ll love this book too. Enjoy!
The Book of Illusions
The Book of Illusions, written with breath-taking urgency and precision, plunges the reader into a universe in which the comic and the tragic, the real and the imagined, and the violent and the tender dissolve into one another.
One man’s obsession with the mysterious life of a silent film star takes him on a journey into a shadow-world of lies, illusions, and unexpected love. After losing his wife and young sons in a plane crash, Vermont professor David Zimmer spends his waking hours mired in grief. Then, watching television one night, he stumbles upon a lost film by silent comedian Hector Mann, and remembers how to laugh.
Paul Auster
Paul Auster is the bestselling author of Report from the Interior, Winter Journal, Sunset Park. Invisible, The Book of Illusions, and The New York Trilogy, among many other works. He has been awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature, the Prix Médicis Étranger. The Independent Spirit Award, and the Premio Napoli. Auster is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
