The Red Notebook

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As you can imagine, since the male protagonist owns a bookshop, books and authors make an appearance. C'est incroyable! No mention of any of the Bronte sisters or Jane Austen novels, or the Great Gatsby or the Catcher in the Rye. I'll drink to that! In case you're wondering, I do not have anything against the above authors or novels, I've read and enjoyed them all, I am just tired of seeing them mentioned in so many novels. Thanks to Antoine Laurain, many known and less known French authors are mentioned. I've added a few more books to my ever growing to-be-read list. Allan Gurganus: "How Do You Introduce Paul Auster in Three Minutes?". The Review of Contemporary Fiction, 14:1 (Spring 1994), pp.7–8.

Laure is just outside her home when she accosted and mugged. Not only does she loose her purse with everything inside it, money, identification, keys; but she also gets a major wound to the head. After managing to convince the hotel across the street to give her a room for the night she end up falling asleep and (SPOILER ). Laurent, is a bookshop owner who happens upon her purse the next day. He ends up vowing to find her and return it to her, despite only a first name to go on. He becomes enamored of the little mystery and the woman who goes along with it. Peter Kirkegaard: "Cities, Signs, Meanings in Walter Benjamin and Paul Auster: Or, Never Sure of Any of It", in Orbis Litterarum: International Review of Literary Studies 48 (1993): 161179.Board of Trustees: 2006–2007 | PEN American Center". www.pen.org. August 28, 2012 . Retrieved January 15, 2016.

Laurent is intrigued by the purse-owner -- the contents, and the notebook-notes, make her seem like an interesting woman -- and decides to try to seek her out. In 2006 Auster directed the film The Inner Life of Martin Frost, based on an original screenplay by him. It was shot in Lisbon and Azenhas do Mar and starred David Thewlis, Iréne Jacob, and Michael Imperioli as well as Auster's daughter Sophie. Auster provided the narration, albeit uncredited. The film premiered at the European Film Market, as part of the 2007 Berlinale in Berlin, Germany on February 10, 2007, and opened in New York City on September 7 of the same year.In a novel that so closely follows the standard Marc Levy blueprint there is of course no question how things will turn out. Being a good citizen, he drops it off at the local cop shop. With the police being too busy to attend to him, Laurent takes the mystery bag home. Determined to do his own detective work, with the intention of re-uniting the bag with its rightful owner, he opens the bag... The story is a little contrived, of course it is, but it works well and it does come from the characters; their actions and their emotions.

His first novel "The Portrait" was published in 2007 and he achieved wide international acclaim with "The Red Notebook". Since then his works have been translated into 14 languages and partly made into films. Antoine Laurain (born 1972) is a French author. He previously worked as a screenwriter and antiques dealer. in German) Heiko Jakubzik: Paul Auster und die Klassiker der American Renaissance. Dissertation, Universität Heidelberg 1999 ( online text) How many things do we feel obliged to do for the sake of it, or for appearances, or because we are trained to do them, but which weigh us down and don’t in fact achieve anything?” In equal parts an offbeat romance, detective story and a clarion call for metropolitans to look after their neighbours. . . . Reading The Red Notebookis a little like finding a gem among the bric-a-brac in a local brocante’ The Telegraph Une existence entiere a lire l'aurait comble, elle ne lui avait pas ete donnee. Il aurait fallu choisir sa voie plus tot, savoir ce que l'on veut faire apres le baccalaureat. Avoir un projet de vie.”The Red Notebook was charming and delightful read. I loved everything about it: the main characters, the plot and the writing.

Gerald Howard: Publishing Paul Auster. The Review of Contemporary Fiction, 14:1 (Spring 1994), pp.92–95. She was an enigma. It was like looking at someone through a fogged-up window. her face was like one encountered in a dream, whose features disolve as soon as you try to recall them.” Auster and his second wife, writer Siri Hustvedt (the daughter of professor and scholar Lloyd Hustvedt), were married in 1981, and they live in Brooklyn. [2] Together they have one daughter, Sophie Auster, a singer. [27] I loved everything about the Red Notebook. The writing is simple but has a beautiful flow. The main characters, Laurent and Laure, are well drawn and interesting. It was refreshing to read a romantic book with middle-aged protagonists. The plot was lovely and romantic, in a realistic way. A complication he is unaware of is that she hit her head when getting mugged, and while she seemed fine right afterwards did suffer a subdural haemotoma, falling into a coma, which is how she spends much of the book, in hospital.One of Auster's more recent books, A Life in Words, was published in October 2017 by Seven Stories Press. It brought together three years of conversations with the Danish scholar I.B. Siegumfeldt about each one of his works, both fiction and non-fiction. It has been considered a primary source for understanding Auster's approach to his works. [15] Even in its brevity the story will transport you right to Paris with its descriptions of Parisian neighborhoods, cafes, book shops, and lines such as this: "Their eyes had met for that fraction of a second during which, without saying a word, a man and a woman who don't know each other signal that the night is not yet over." This is one of those stories that is perfect as a short story, any longer and the plot would fizzle; but at the same time too short to really get a good feel for the characters. However, though you don’t get as close to the characters, or delve too much into the nitty gritty of who they are, it is still easy to root for them! Scott Dimovitz: "Public Personae and the Private I: De-Compositional Ontology in Paul Auster's The New York Trilogy". MFS: Modern Fiction Studies. 52:3 (Fall 2006): 613–633. He was on the PEN American Center Board of Trustees from 2004 to 2009, [9] [10] and Vice President during 2005 to 2007. [11] [12]