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4 3 2 1

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4 3 2 1

By: Paul Auster
Narrated by: Paul Auster
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About this listen

Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2017

Narrated by the award-winning author himself, this epic tale invites you into a world where the fate of a single person takes four different turns. Graceful and eloquent, it's a touching story of how a life can be dramatically altered by the choices you make.

Paul Auster's first novel in seven years. His greatest, most provocative, most heartbreaking, most satisfying work. A sweeping story of birthright and possibility, of love and the fullness of life itself. A masterpiece.

This audiobook contains exclusive bonus material in the form of an interview with the author.

On March 3, 1947, in the maternity ward of Beth Israel Hospital in Newark, New Jersey, Archibald Isaac Ferguson, the one and only child of Rose and Stanley Ferguson, is born. From that single beginning, Ferguson's life will take four simultaneous and independent fictional paths. Four Fergusons made of the same genetic material, four boys who are the same boy, will go on to lead four parallel and entirely different lives. Family fortunes diverge. Loves and friendships and intellectual passions contrast. Chapter by chapter, the rotating narratives evolve into an elaborate dance of inner worlds enfolded within the outer forces of history as, one by one, the intimate plot of each Ferguson's story rushes on across the tumultuous and fractured terrain of mid twentieth-century America. A boy grows up - again and again and again.

As inventive and dexterously constructed as anything Paul Auster has ever written, 4 3 2 1 is an unforgettable tour de force, the crowning work of this masterful writer's extraordinary career.

Paul Auster is the best-selling author of Winter Journal, Sunset Park, Man in the Dark, The Brooklyn Follies, The Book of Illusions and The New York Trilogy, among many other works. In 2006 he was awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature and inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Among his other honours are the Independent Spirit Award for the screenplay of Smoke and the Prix Medicis Etranger for Leviathan. He has also been short-listed for both the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award (The Book of Illusions) and the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction (The Music of Chance). His work has been translated into more than 30 languages. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

©2017 Paul Auster (P)2017 Macmillan Audio
Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction

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Critic reviews

"One of the great writers of our time." ( San Francisco Chronicle)
All stars
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An engaging story that explores how turning a different corner, making a different choice, can affect ones whole path in life. I loved the characters and really enjoyed following their stories. The fact that their paths were set against and entwined with real events..the civil rights movement. ..the war in Vietnam etc. made their journeys all the more vivid. A very good audible download.

engaging

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I enjoyed the first 2/3rds of the book but then it became increasingly tedious. List after list of names, books, records, anything you can think of. Lots of repetitive sentences. An increasingly monotone and mumbling narrator, so that by the end of the book I used to play it to put me to sleep. I enjoyed the various stories, got a real sense of the different people who were key in Ferguson's four lives, though not of him, he was kind of empty, just a vessel for the author to push his thoughts through. With a serious edit this book would have been great.

Interesting concept but too long

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it did drag a little and quite pretentious in places but overall it was very enjoyable.

cool novel

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One part of me thinks..there’s 35 hrs of my life I’ll never get back and the other part of me is glad that I stuck with it.
I found it very confusing at times. As I said, it may be better to read book rather than listen to audio version, as the story skips back and forward between ‘versions’, I would have needed to go back to read the last few pages of the previous part to refresh my memory as to that storyline. Too difficult to do this with audio due to no visible chapter heads.
Also I never really took to any of the Fergusons. So didn’t find this really encouraging to read on, definitely not intriguing.
I did learn a lot however.
His of knowledge of literature and American history was actually what made it interesting. As someone from the UK but having spent time in the States in my 20s, I am always keen to learn more but not one for historical novels, so having some sort of storyline to follow helped me stick at it. I love anything based in New York. It didn’t surprise me to hear in the interview at the end that PA had gone to Columbia U during the protests and also had first hand knowledge of Newark riots etc.
I did think it helped that the author read the book, enjoyed his accent and tone, and you could tell he understood and liked his characters, even if I got a bit lost at times.

I think it was just too long. Maybe better if you read the book to allow you to flick back when confused.

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Amazing achievement. Read by the author. An extra dimension. Worth the 30+ hours of one's attention.

Amazing

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