A dense, short, brilliant story about a retired miracle healer (or perhaps a self-deluded quack) that ponders about reality, enlightenment, and the nature of miracles. He prepares his mystical and absurd writings while a medical doctor is out to expose him. Bounded and carefully hallucinatory, and touching on topics such as the nature of writing, pragmatism as evil, and the wisdom of apparent fools. The book is also funnier than my description above implies. It's great stuff. ( )

This short story by the Argentine writer César Aria is, in my opinion, a rather brilliant piece of literature. Told in the first person by the mentally deranged "Doctor Aria", this story ends with a completely hallucinated chapter that begins in a strange and somewhat confusing way and finishes with the uncontrollable laugher by everyone involved (the fictional characters present at the scene and the reader) but Dr. Aria... ( )