I just finished Paul Auster’s Man in the Dark (published in 2008).  Tears are in my eyes and my heart is pounding.  This book is perfect, a genuine communication from the heart.  Auster is always a good writer but in this book he is great.  The writing is sincere and true, even the parts that are grim fantasy (the United States torn apart in a secessionist war). The story of a man, his daughter, and his granddaughter, all facing their own heartbreaks — “life is disappointing, isn’t it?” — and yet “the weird world rolls on.”   What joy there is in that knowledge that it does roll on, that with all the unkindness, and worse, brutality and evil, the generations go on and there are moments of connection that are so beautiful that they can be understood as proof of God (as one character believes, for a while anyway) or just wonderful, passing luck.

Joy, connection, peace, responsibility: Auster takes all these themes, really big themes that have been written about for hundreds and hundreds of years, and he writes a book that is utterly fresh, a book that is ancient and new.  A truly beautiful accomplishment.  I will read this book again, I know, and find even more there, more sentences and visuals and hints at both misery and joy.  Auster is a natural writer, and so gifted; with this book, he has given us something wonderful.