Collected Novels Volume 2

In The Music of Chance, the story of Jim Nashe and Jack Pozzi, Auster evokes the strong European influences of Samuel Beckett and Franz Kafka in a brilliant and unsettling parable of loss and gambling. In Leviathan, he makes perhaps his most direct attempt at exploring the political reality of contemporary American life, through the figure of Peter Aaron and his challenge to the complacency of modern life. Finally, in Mr Vertigo Auster crafts a cautionary tale of greed and exploitation in the story of Walt, the irrepressible orphan from the Mid-West, who learns the art of levitation under the tutelage of Master Yehudi. Highly varied, yet instantly recognisable as the work of the same storyteller, these three novels form the next chapter in the ongoing career of one of America's most enduring and fascinating writers. 'Paul Auster is one of those sages with confounding talent - confounding for one because he's simply that good . . . He belongs among Vonnegut, Roth, and DeLillo . . .' Claire Howorth 'Auster truly is a master of his art.' Harper's Bazaar

Paul Auster was the bestselling author of 4 3 2 1, Sunset Park, The Book of Illusions, Moon Palace and The New York Trilogy. He and Spencer Ostrander collaborated on Bloodbath Nation. In 2006, he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature. His other honours include the Prix Medicis Étranger for Leviathan, the Independent Spirit Award for the Screenplay of Smoke, the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Burning Boy, and the Carlos Fuentes Prize for his body of work. His novel 4 3 2 1 was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and was a Commandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. His work was translated into more than forty languages. His final novel, Baumgartner, was published in November 2023. He died on 30 April 2024.