Question

Read the book review and answer the questions.
1.What kind of stories was Paul Auster looking for?
a.real stories that weren’t too long
b.the listeners’ favourites tories
c.true stories about famous people
2.Why did he decide to put the stories in the book?
a.because he wanted to share them all with the public
b.to make some money
c.because he couldn't read them all out on the radio
3.What does the reviewer recommend?
a.to read the book from start to finish
b.to pick and choose stories from the book
c.to only read the sections you are most interested in
4.What is the reviewer’s overall opinion of the book?
a.He liked it because the stories are so well written.
b.He liked it because some of the stories are very moving.
c.He liked another book of real-life stories more.

REVIEW:
True Tales of American Life
In 1999, the writer Paul Auster was asked if he would contribute stories to America’s National Public Radio. But Auster decided to ask listeners to send their stories instead. He wanted true stories that seemed like fiction. They could be about anything at all, they just had to be true and short; the ones chosen would be read aloud on the radio.
To Auster’s surprise, more than 4000 listeners sent in stories. It would have been impossible to read them all on the radio, so Auster took almost 200 of them and put them in a book – this book.
I liked some things about the collection, others not so much. Because the stories were written by ordinary people, they’re not always well-written (I hate to think what the ones that weren’t included were like!). And the categorisation into sections like Families, Objects, Strangers, or Animals means that if you read one story after the other, it can be a bit repetitive. But with any book of separate stories, you can just read one here and there whenever you feel like it, you don’t have to read it straight through: and that’s probably the best thing to do here, too.


What’s great about these stories is their veracity – they’re all true, no matter how unbelievable (and some of them really are incredible). One or two of the stories left me almost in tears, they were so painful.
So, overall it’s worth getting and reading.
If you’re into real-life stories like these, I’d also recommend a collection called The Moth – more on this next time.

Answer 1

1. a
2. c
3.c.
4.c.

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