by Paul Auster
First published 2010
Miles Heller works as a trash-out specialist in southern Florida, clearing foreclosed properties during the 2008 financial crisis. He compulsively photographs the possessions families left behind when they lost their homes. Miles connects with a group of young people who squat in a Sunset Park apartment in Brooklyn. Their world intersects with a celebrated actress returning to Broadway, an independent publisher fighting to preserve both his business and his marriage, and the Hospital for Broken Things, a place dedicated to restoring objects from a disappearing world. The 1946 film The Best Years of Our Lives threads through their stories. As these characters navigate economic collapse and personal upheaval, they search for connection and meaning amid the wreckage of contemporary America. The novel explores how people rebuild their lives when everything familiar crumbles around them.
Genres: literary-fiction, american-fiction, contemporary, 21st-century
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, rebuilding-life
Setting: Brooklyn, Florida, Sunset Park
Period: 2008
309 pages · Hardcover · Henry Holt and Co.