So you think you know why people are the way they are, huh, do ya, bigshot? Well why don’t you try to imagine a language uninformed by experience? Why don’t you try to be someone you aren’t, tough guy. Can ya even do it? Are ya too soft?

Pues como me pasa casi siempre con Auster, tengo la sensación de haberme perdido algo importante. Aun así, se me ha hecho más llevadero en versión gráfica. Está bien, pero no me ha emocionado. Y lo dicho, creo que no lo he entendido.

i cant tell if this is the greatest thing ive ever read or just a thing ive read

This book surprised me!! The story wasn't my favorite thing - if I had read the novel that inspired this graphic novel, the rating probably wouldn't be this high... but the story was done so well in graphic novel format
The way art was used to tell a story, to (I suspect) show the rhythm of the writing, the visual and metaphors that probably existed in the novel... I just can't express how well art was used in this - it was done in a way I had never seen before, it was more than just telling you what happened, it explored the mind and writing as a process
Really, if you like art, check out this book, because it was used in such an amazing way :)

Another short graphic novel I picked up not knowing what to expect. This was an amazing read for an evening. The artwork was really cool and well done, and the story itself was dark and captivating. Like nothing I’ve ever read before. I loved it so much, I’ll have to find the original book that this is an adaptation of!

I seem to be in the minority, judging by the rave reviews this book has gotten. Perhaps I'm just not a big fan of unconventional stories, or perhaps I just find the author's style (and the fact that he's woven himself into this narrative) somewhat pretentious. I can appreciate what he's trying to do with this graphic novel, but I'm not sure how well he succeeded. And I feel as if I became genuinely interested in the narrative, only to have it yanked out from under me in the final quarter of the book... the rest of it isn't without its share of confusion.

Quinn is a novelist who, after the death of his wife and son, has taken to writing detective novels under a pen name. His otherwise-quiet life is shattered one day by a phone call -- someone has mistaken him for a private detective named Paul Auster, and wants to hire him to take on a case. Quinn, on a whim, accepts, and finds himself taking on the persona of the private detective in his writing in order to investigate Peter, a now-grown victim of childhood abuse who fears his father is coming after him again. As Quinn trails Peter's father, he finds himself drawn into not only the man's obsession with language, but the mystery of who Paul Auster really is... and finds his identity, and his very sanity, slipping away the deeper he gets involved in the case...

There are a lot of separate elements to this story -- Quinn's dead family, his writing of novels under a pen name, Peter's traumatic past of abuse, Peter's father's obsession with finding the ultimate language of God, Paul Auster inserting himself as a character in his own story, etc. -- that never really gel together into a cohesive whole. I felt that we were treated to a lot of plot threads, and was hoping that Quinn's efforts to solve the mystery would eventually tie all these threads together into a single story. Unfortunately, that never happens -- everything seems to just be thrown together, as if Paul Auster just wrote whatever felt interesting that day without caring if it meshed with the rest of the story. Maybe he was trying to be artistic by writing an unconventional story, as a conventional story would have found a way to weave all these story elements together... but apparently that's not what all the cool kids are doing these days.

Yes, call me a stick-in-the-mud for liking a traditional story with a clear-cut story arc, ending, and the utilization of every plot thread. But there's a reason we have those structures -- they WORK. Creating a story that throws off those structures and instead gives us a wandering thrown-together mess of a story, complete with an ending that doesn't end so much as just stagger to a baffling halt, may be interesting from an artistic standpoint, but it really isn't entertaining or satisfying to a reader.

As comics are a visual medium, the artwork should come under some scrutiny as well. It's... not terrible. It's nicely stylized, if a little bland, and professionally done, but not memorable. And at times it descends into weird symbolism that feels more pretentious than actually serving the story... and shifts to an oddly more realistic art style when portraying Auster himself, which is jarring.

I understand that "City of Glass" started life as a novella before being adapted as a graphic novel... but I didn't like this book well enough to check out the source material. It feels pretentious and confusing just for the sake of being pretentious and confusing, and really wasn't made much better by being made into a comic.

A solid graphic adaptation of a novel I really enjoyed. Here's a copy of my Goodreads review of that work:

This could so easily have been a mess but Auster makes it work and turns it into a delightful read. Daniel Quinn, the protagonist writes detective novels under the pseudonym William Wilson and the protagonist of these novels is Max Work. Quinn gets a phone call from someone trying to reach Paul Auster (yeah, that Paul Auster) to hire him for some detective work. At first Quinn says he’s not Paul Auster but soon relents and takes the case. If you wonder how he’ll deposit a fee check made out to Paul Auster, you’re not alone; it occurs to Quinn also. I’ll, stop here so as to avoid spoilers. Suffice it to say if you relax and go with the flow, you’ll enjoy.

The rare adaptation that exceeds its source material. A doubly impressive feat since it's based on Paul Auster's best novel. With its deft ink strokes and airtight plot, this brilliant graphic perfectly captures and distills the original existential detective story. One of the great graphic novels and a perfect introduction to the fictional world of Paul Auster, too.

'La ciudad de cristal' es mi favorita de todas las cosas que ha escrito Paul Auster. Es también lo primero que leí de este escritor. Es la primera parte de la 'Trilogía de Nueva York' que a día de hoy me sigue pareciendo la única obra de Auster realmente conseguida. Es por esto que me animé a leer esta adaptación en forma de cómic (o novela gráfica, lo que ustedes prefieran). Una parte de mí no era muy optimista. Una parte de mí sólo quería leerlo para ver como este noble intento fracasaba. Sin embargo, no ha sido así. A pesar de que es una historia muy poco visual y bastante abstracta, el cómic se sale airoso, encuentra una serie de soluciones visuales realmente originales y que plasman perfectamente el tono de la obra original de Auster sin dejar de dar un punto de vista personal, algo que no era nada pero nada fácil. La recomendaría para curiosos que disfrutaron de la 'Trilogía de Nueva York'.

Such a hauntingly beautiful graphic novel.

Fucking stupid.

It's nothing short of a cute and novel expiriment that doesn't really go anywhere. My disapointment with this graphic novel was sorely exacerbated once I found out Spiegelman was the creative overseer and he did nothing to focus the narrative which is presented way too piecemeal and cut up for a normal reader to understand littleone enjoy.

Θα ήταν πραγματικά αδύνατον το οποιοδήποτε graphic novel να φτάσει τα βάθη και τις λογοτεχνικές κορυφές της νουβέλας του Auster. Παρ'όλα αυτά, στο συγκεκριμένο έχει γίνει εξαιρετική δουλειά τόσο στην εικονογράφηση όσο και στην προσπάθεια να κρατηθεί το ύφος και ο πυρήνας της ιστορίας του αυθεντικού κειμένου του Auster. Έτσι, το αποτέλεσμα αποζημιώνει και με το παραπάνω, κυρίως με τα εκπληκτικής ομορφιάς σκίτσα που καταφέρνουν να μετουσιώσουν σε εικόνες τα διάφορα περιστατικά που λαμβάνουν χώρα στο πρωτότυπο κείμενο.