' That is how it works in the City Every time you think you know the answer to a question you discover that the question makes no sense ' This is the story of Anna Blume & her journey to find her lost brother William in the unnamed City Like the City itself however it is a journey that is doomed & so all that is left is Anna's unwritten account of what happened Paul Auster takes us to an unspecified & devastated world in which the self disappears amidst the horrors that surround us But this is not just an imaginary futuristic world like the settings of Kafka stories it is one that echoes our own & in doing so addresses some of our darker legacies In the Country of Last Things is a tense psychological take on the dystopian novel It continues Auster's deep exploration of his central themes the modern city the mysteries of storytelling & the elusive & unstable nature of truth