January Book - "The Brooklyn Follies"

Happy new year!!
January's book is "The Brooklyn Follies" by Paul Auster. For this meetup, we are returning to one of the group's favorite spots - UnWined in Manchester, NH.

Click here to view an excerpt from the book.

Also, here is The New Yorker's review:
After a "sad and ridiculous life" in the suburbs, Nathan Glass retires, gets divorced, and moves to Brooklyn to die. To pass the time, he decides to write an account of mishaps and mistakes, beginning with his own?"The Book of Human Folly." "The tone would be light and farcical throughout," he says, "and my only purpose was to keep myself entertained." Auster seems to have had a similar intent. A chance encounter with a long-lost nephew leads Nathan into an unlikely second act, involving a longer-lost niece, her runaway daughter, and a host of lively Brooklyn caricatures?a gay used-bookstore owner, a tough widow, an H.I.V.-positive drag queen?all in the midst of unlikely second acts themselves. Nathan narrates increasingly absurd events with persistent cheer, a tone mirrored by the blinkered optimism and liberal conviction of pre-9/11 Park Slope; it's a combination that soon seems less hopeful than hollow, and profoundly disengaged.
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Hope to see you there!