Auster - New York Trilogy (City of Glass, Ghosts, Locked Room), Contemp Americation Fiction Series, PB

1990

City of Glass - As a result of a strange phone call in the middle of the night, Quinn, a writer of detective stories, becomes enmeshed in a case more puzzling than any he might have written. Ghosts Blue - a student of Brown, has been hired by White to spy on Black. From a window of a rented room on Orange Street, Blue keeps watch on his subject, who is across the street, staring out of his window. The Locked Room - Fanshawe has disappeared, leaving behind his wife and baby and a cache of extraordinary novels, plays, and poems. What happened to him--and why is the narrator, Fanshawe's boyhood friend, lured obsessively into his life?

First published in 1985-1986, The New York Trilogy (City of Glass, Ghosts, and The Locked Room) brought immediate international attention to its author, Paul Auster, and elevated him to near-celebrity status, particularly in France.  Auster's trilogy broke ground in its mix of serious fictional techniques and detective and mystery genres.