What a stellar writer! I know I am not the first to feel this way about Paul Auster, but it is thrilling to read such a fine author for the first time. Auster has created characters who will never be forgotten, despite their disappearances, namely, Hector Mann, David Zimmer and others. This book is like a wave which crashes over you and pulls you into it like a force of nature. The layering of the plot is fabulous. The story turns in on itself over and over, like that crashing wave. The themes of grief, penance, survival, and sheer humanity are powerfully explored with lovely use of language. A must read! ( )

http://thebookwormslibrary.com/?p=105... ( )

Great American story for a so-hot vacation in Greece !
Enjoyed every single word of it, while taking neverending night showers... A vacation to remember. ( )

From the title The Book of Illusions I expected to be deceived, that people and events would not be as they seemed and I was not disappointed. This book is full of illusions. It tells the stories of two men, David Zimmer, a professor whose wife and two sons were killed in a plane crash and Hector Mann, a silent movie star who disappeared mysteriously in 1929. David is plunged into depression and “lived in a blur of alcoholic grief and self-pity” until he watched a clip from one of Hector’s films. It made him laugh. He became obsessed with Hector, the man in the white tropical suit, with a thin black mustache, which Hector used as an “instrument of communication”, speaking a “language without words, its wiggles and flutters are as clear and comprehensible as a message tapped out in Morse code. … the mustache monologues.” In typical silent movie style Hector with his slicked-back hair, thin and greasy little mustache and white suit is the target and focal point of every mishap.

David takes leave of absence from the university and studies Hector’s films, eventually writing a book about him, intrigued by his disappearance. Then he receives a letter from Hector’s wife, in which she reveals that Hector is alive and wants to meet David before he dies. He asks for proof that Hector is indeed alive. The rest of the novel reveals what happened to Hector and why he disappeared, in a series of melodramatic incidents. It’s a tense tale as David accompanied by Alma, directed by Hector to persuade David to visit him, rushes to the Blue Stone ranch in New Mexico, where he finds Hector on his deathbed, guarded by Frieda his wife who seems to resent David’s presence.

There are stories within stories; subterfuge, crime, shootings, issues of identity, love, death, disguises and deception abound in this book. ( )

"The Book of Illusions" is one of the most appropriate titles I have run across. In it, Paul Auster describes a continual series of misconception, misapprehension, broken promises, regret ... let us count the ways.

The illusions revolve around a series of silent film actors and producers. Each principal believes he or she can have a life with another who wants nothing to do with it. Hector Mann, a main player in this drama, left filmmaking many years ago and directed that all his oevre be destroyed, reducing all of it to the level of an illusion. Did it ever really exist? He lived in a ranch in New Mexico, called the Blue Jewel until his (accidental? suspicious?) death. In one of the great and grand illusions of this book, he named his ranch after a brief but memorable episode in his life: he is out walking his dog on a damp evening, when he thinks he sees a jewel asparkle on the sidewalk. He inspects it closely only to find it a shiny spot of spittle.

Auster is a robust prose artist. His plot pulls us along but has the delicacy to reflect and reverberate against and within itself. This story will engage you, and will make you wonder at Auster's skill. ( )