Paul Auster - The Brooklyn Follies - Review

Nathan is a retired life insurance salesman who has lung cancer that has gone into remission. Recently divorced, the assets split amicably, he decides to go back to his roots and live the rest of his life in Brooklyn. He rents a flat in his old neighborhood and slowly settles into what seems to be a quiet retirement. Nathan has also started to write a book of sorts, "The Book of Human Folly," an account of every blunder, embarrassment, idiocy, and inane act he has committed and experienced throughout his long life. These tales of life's absurdities are also about other people, revealing the pure folly of the human condition. For the most part, the narrative centers on Nathan's nephew, Tom, a failed academic who has given up on life, where they coincidentally meet in Brooklyn and grow to be good friends. This short summary may appear boring, a book about normal people living mundane lives, but that's what makes this novel so good, the mundane becomes the miraculous, the ordinary the extraordinary.

Paul Auster is arguably one of the greatest living American writers working today. Reading his novels is a captivating journey into the extraordinary, a glimpse at possibilities, an opportunity to view the world from a different perspective. In some cases, one changes and sees life differently, sometimes for the better.

I'll never forget my first Auster novel, "A New York Trilogy," becoming totally submerged in a world so alien, so odd, and so fascinating that it was astounding to discover an author with such talent and erudition. This writer had something special happening; thus, I read everything I could get my hands on: "Moon Palace," "The Music of Chance," "Leviathan," and "Mr.Vertigo," which happens to be one of the most original tales to come out in the last twenty-five years. "The Brooklyn Follies" had me enthralled from the first chapter, wanting to know more about these characters, their talents, loves, and mishaps, coming to a conclusion that we are by and large a strange species, and at the bottom, it is our need for companionship, love if you will, that gets us into trouble but also keeps us struggling, at times making life worth living, and sometimes a living hell.

Nathan is at worst a cynic, although a man who really wants to do the right thing, help his apathetic nephew, reconnect with his only daughter, innocently flirt with the married waitress at his lunchtime haunt (which has dire consequences) and write about the human condition. Nathan is everyman, a good soul, and has grown not to take life too seriously, which he has discovered comes with age.

This is a compelling novel about ordinary people with dreams and aspirations, disappointments and triumphs, embarrassments, and success, depicting the modern human condition with all its craziness, stupidity, and humor.

An excellent novel.