One night a week I'm down in Quarryville and since I don't spend near enough time in libraries, I like to hang out there for a little while. I was browsing the fiction there a couple of weeks ago and I saw a Christmas book by Paul Auster on the shelf. "Well, that's different", I said. It is very different and is intended to be so.
In typical Auster fashion, the story is told as if it were told to Auster. We don't know how much is real, how much is fictitious. The story says that The New York Times had contacted Auster to write a Christmas story and he didn't want to write a typical sappy Christmas tale. He struggled until he started talking with his cigar vendor, Auggie Wren (whose name has been changed), who tells him his Christmas story which Auster then uses. Some of that is true. The story originally appeared on Christmas Day in The New York Times. You can read the entire story at that link.
The tale involves shoplifting, a lost wallet, a blind woman, and another theft. The story makes you think. Can lying and stealing be part of a good deed? Is giving giving if there is taking?
A very unorthodox and not really heartwarming Christmas tale, just like Auster wanted. It's so short and so typical Paul Auster that I can't help but like it, though.
--Jon
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