Oracle Night: Amazon.ca: Books

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First Sentence
I had been sick for a long time. Read the first page

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Concordance

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Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover

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Customer Reviews

37 Reviews

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(7)
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Average Customer Review

3.3 out of 5 stars (37 customer reviews)

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Most helpful customer reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Another stellar Auster effort, Dec 24 2008

By	NorthVan Dave (North Vancouver, British Columbia Canada) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Oracle Night: A Novel (Paperback)

Oracle Night continues author Paul Austers writing style of delivering stories within stories within stories.

To whit. The story focuses on novelist Sidney Orr who, while recovering from an illness, purchases a blue notebook. Over the course of a week, the notebook consumes his life. And after a period of inactivity on the writing front, the notebook inspires Orr to start writing/working on a novel again. Of course while he starts work on his new book, other aspects of Orrs life start to swirl around him leading to no end of confusion on his part.

In short, I liked this book. I didnt like it as much as some of Austers other novels, notably The Brooklyn Follies or The New York Trilogy, but I found this novel quite entertaining. I took a vested interest in Sidney Orr and wanted to keep reading the book to find out how it ended. Auster did a good job, in my opinion, of pulling the reader in.

My only complaint about the novel is that as part of the story, Auster had his protagonist Orr start writing a story in his blue notebook. The story, I thought, as quite good and I was disappointed that because of certain turns in the novel itself, we never get to learn how the story Orr was writing ends. As a reader, were left hanging.

This minor complaint aside though, I thought Oracle Night as a good book and I recommend it to anyone looking for an entertaining novel to read.

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5.0 out of 5 stars Magnificent Work By An Underappreciated Writer, Jul 13 2004

By	Charles J. Rector (Woodstock, IL United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Oracle Night (Hardcover)

Paul Auster is both one of the best writers around and also one of the most underappreciated. However, he does enjoy a certain cult status with readers who appreciate truly imaginative fiction.

The book begins when one Sidney Orr goes out and buys a blue notebook. That does not sound terribly interesting, but its what Orr does with the notebook that makes this book special.

Orr writes a novel in the blue notebook purporting to forcast future events. As the novel progresses, it exerts a strange influence on the folks in Orr's life.

As the above demonstrates, Oracle Night is a strange work, but its the wonderful writing that makes it hard to put the book down. This is truly a magnificent piece of work.

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2.0 out of 5 stars Gassy, precious, arrogant, and ultimately merely deflated, Jul 6 2004

By	Erica Bell (Washington State) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Oracle Night (Hardcover)

A novel about a NYC loft-type writer-guy writing a novel about a NYC writer-gal writing a novel about a guy who can see into the future. Please.

It had much promise, too---especially his tale about a man deserting his old life to forge an anonymous one in a new, non- New York city (yes, Virginia, they exist), who, by a circuitous and well-tried route via An Old Black Cab Driver, ends up locking himself in a....well, I won't give it away. It's one of the few bright spots of the book.

I don't think Mr. Auster actually meant to be so tired and shopworn. I just don't think that some writers realise that not everyone is enthralled with the NYC Writer-As-Mage image. Of course words have meaning. Of course they have power. In the right hands, they transcend everything human. Not so here. The prose is weirdly stilted and empty of all subtlety. The story meanders around nine days of disjointed happenings, with the writer seeming to shout periodically, "This is Important!" Nope. It's not.

Other writers have tackled the city as character, and the writer as shamen---the lilting, dreamlike "Mother London" of Michael Moorcock comes to mind. This weird offering is either too subtle--or too silly---for my poor sensibilities and unfortunately, I don't care enough about the characters to discern which it is.

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Most recent customer reviews

1.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed
Heard a wonderful interview several weeks back with Paul Auster and Terry Gross on "Fresh Air," so I was very much looking forward to reading this book. Read more

Published on Jun 28 2004

2.0 out of 5 stars Patchwork
I'm not sure if the two-star rating is for me or for Mr. Auster: me for being dumb, or the author for writing a half-senseless story. Read more

Published on Jun 21 2004 by Diana Poskrop