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Ghost Stories: A Memoir
Not yet published
Expected 5 May 26One of the most anticipated books of 2026 for the Guardian, Observer and BBC Culture
The tender memoir of the forty-three years Siri Hustvedt spent with her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster - from their first encounter in 1980s New York to his death in 2024
Ghost Stories is Siri Hustvedt's most personal work yet, a searing and intimate meditation on grief, memory, and enduring love, written in the aftermath of the death of her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster.
It is a patchwork-quilt book that stitches together memories from over forty years of love and life journal entries Siri wrote between early November 2023, when Paul first became ill, and 3 May 2024, the day of his funeral; e-mails Siri sent to friends during Paul's cancer treatment; notes Paul sent her over the course of their relationship; and three love letters Siri wrote to him in 1981, when he left her for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life with his first wife and son.
The book also contains Paul Auster's last ever piece of writing - the first thirty-five pages of what he hoped would be a small book of letters to Siri's and his grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, born on 1st January 2024.
The result is an emotional, full-bodied story of Siri Hustvedt and Paul Auster's life together, an exploration of how grief unmoors time and how the intimacy of a shared life continues to mark the everyday.
'I began writing Ghost Stories shortly after my husband, Paul Auster, died on April 30th 2024. My meditations on Paul's cancer, his death, my grief, the potent feeling I had of his presence on the day he was buried, and my memories from the years we spent together are interwoven with several texts that were written before he twelve letters I wrote to friends during his cancer treatment; journal entries I wrote between early November, 2023 and May 3, 2024; and three love letters I wrote to Paul in 1981, when he left me for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life. Although I knew Paul had saved those letters, I hadn't read them since they were written and had only a foggy recollection of their content.
In the last month of his life, Paul began writing what he hoped would be a small book of letters to our grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, who was born on January 1st, 2024. Paul was too weak to finish it as planned, but the thirty-five pages he did manage to write are interwoven in this book.
I want to stress that Paul's text is not an appendix to mine but an integral part of the book as a whole. Because the memoir turns on attachment, betweenness, and dialogue, all crucial to the love affair that lasted forty-three years, the insertion of one author's text into another's, is, in this case, essential to the memoir's overall meaning.'
Praise for Siri Hustvedt:
'She's a twenty-first-centuryVirginia Woolf, with many intellectual and creative rooms of her own'
Literary Review
'It is Hustvedt's gift to write with exemplary clarity of what is by necessity unclear'
Hilary Mantel, Guardian
'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom'
Salman Rushdie
The tender memoir of the forty-three years Siri Hustvedt spent with her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster - from their first encounter in 1980s New York to his death in 2024
Ghost Stories is Siri Hustvedt's most personal work yet, a searing and intimate meditation on grief, memory, and enduring love, written in the aftermath of the death of her husband, writer, poet and filmmaker Paul Auster.
It is a patchwork-quilt book that stitches together memories from over forty years of love and life journal entries Siri wrote between early November 2023, when Paul first became ill, and 3 May 2024, the day of his funeral; e-mails Siri sent to friends during Paul's cancer treatment; notes Paul sent her over the course of their relationship; and three love letters Siri wrote to him in 1981, when he left her for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life with his first wife and son.
The book also contains Paul Auster's last ever piece of writing - the first thirty-five pages of what he hoped would be a small book of letters to Siri's and his grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, born on 1st January 2024.
The result is an emotional, full-bodied story of Siri Hustvedt and Paul Auster's life together, an exploration of how grief unmoors time and how the intimacy of a shared life continues to mark the everyday.
'I began writing Ghost Stories shortly after my husband, Paul Auster, died on April 30th 2024. My meditations on Paul's cancer, his death, my grief, the potent feeling I had of his presence on the day he was buried, and my memories from the years we spent together are interwoven with several texts that were written before he twelve letters I wrote to friends during his cancer treatment; journal entries I wrote between early November, 2023 and May 3, 2024; and three love letters I wrote to Paul in 1981, when he left me for a period of nine or ten days to return to his former life. Although I knew Paul had saved those letters, I hadn't read them since they were written and had only a foggy recollection of their content.
In the last month of his life, Paul began writing what he hoped would be a small book of letters to our grandson, Miles Auster Hustvedt Ostrander, who was born on January 1st, 2024. Paul was too weak to finish it as planned, but the thirty-five pages he did manage to write are interwoven in this book.
I want to stress that Paul's text is not an appendix to mine but an integral part of the book as a whole. Because the memoir turns on attachment, betweenness, and dialogue, all crucial to the love affair that lasted forty-three years, the insertion of one author's text into another's, is, in this case, essential to the memoir's overall meaning.'
Praise for Siri Hustvedt:
'She's a twenty-first-centuryVirginia Woolf, with many intellectual and creative rooms of her own'
Literary Review
'It is Hustvedt's gift to write with exemplary clarity of what is by necessity unclear'
Hilary Mantel, Guardian
'Hustvedt is that rare artist, a writer of high intelligence, profound sensuality and a less easily definable capacity for which the only word I can find is wisdom'
Salman Rushdie
Kindle Edition
Expected publication May 5, 2026
43 people are currently reading
756 people want to read
About the author
Siri Hustvedt
92 books2,564 followersHustvedt was born in Northfield, Minnesota. Her father Lloyd Hustvedt was a professor of Scandinavian literature, and her mother Ester Vegan emigrated from Norway at the age of thirty. She holds a B.A. in history from St. Olaf College and a Ph.D. in English from Columbia University; her thesis on Charles Dickens was entitled Figures of Dust: A Reading of Our Mutual Friend.
Hustvedt has mainly made her name as a novelist, but she has also produced a book of poetry, and has had short stories and essays on various subjects published in (among others) The Art of the Essay, 1999, The Best American Short Stories 1990 and 1991, The Paris Review, Yale Review, and Modern Painters.
Like her husband Paul Auster, Hustvedt employs a use of repetitive themes or symbols throughout her work. Most notably the use of certain types of voyeurism, often linking objects of the dead to characters who are relative strangers to the deceased characters (most notable in various facits in her novels The Blindfold and The Enchantment of Lily Dahl) and the exploration of identity. She has also written essays on art history and theory (see "Essay collections") and painting and painters often appear in her fiction, most notably, perhaps, in her novel, What I Loved.
She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband, writer Paul Auster, and their daughter, singer and actress Sophie Auster.
Hustvedt has mainly made her name as a novelist, but she has also produced a book of poetry, and has had short stories and essays on various subjects published in (among others) The Art of the Essay, 1999, The Best American Short Stories 1990 and 1991, The Paris Review, Yale Review, and Modern Painters.
Like her husband Paul Auster, Hustvedt employs a use of repetitive themes or symbols throughout her work. Most notably the use of certain types of voyeurism, often linking objects of the dead to characters who are relative strangers to the deceased characters (most notable in various facits in her novels The Blindfold and The Enchantment of Lily Dahl) and the exploration of identity. She has also written essays on art history and theory (see "Essay collections") and painting and painters often appear in her fiction, most notably, perhaps, in her novel, What I Loved.
She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband, writer Paul Auster, and their daughter, singer and actress Sophie Auster.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 15, 2026
A beautiful long letter of love and death to one of the most talented writers of our time from her equally brilliant wife, in this book Siri Hustvedt celebrates the life of Paul Auster and their 43 year long marriage, with the highs and lows of every relationship, but with a deep sense of mutual respect and admiration for each other. She invites the reader to step into their most intimate moments with a poignant honesty that jumps out of the book. In it she compiles letters, fragments of their books and anecdotes that reveal their deepest thoughts and sensitivity. And lovingly she allows the reader to step into the quietness of death.
If I already admired both of them before this book comes to cement that admiration and leaves me with the need of revisit their works again.
If I already admired both of them before this book comes to cement that admiration and leaves me with the need of revisit their works again.
March 13, 2026
Eine große Liebe endet nicht einfach. Sie verändert nur ihre Form.
Ghost Stories von Siri Hustvedt fühlt sich an wie ein stiller Raum voller Erinnerungen, in dem jede Bewegung eine neue Spur freilegt. Schon nach wenigen Seiten entsteht das Gefühl, einem zutiefst persönlichen Tagebuch beizuwohnen, das zugleich weit über eine einzelne Beziehung hinausweist.
Der Verlust von Paul Auster steht im Mittelpunkt dieses Buches, doch es geht um viel mehr als Trauer. Hustvedt schreibt über die seltsame Gegenwart eines Menschen, der nicht mehr da ist und doch überall spürbar bleibt. In Kleidungsstücken, in Gerüchen, in Büchern, in Worten. Diese Momente wirken nicht wie literarische Konstruktionen, sondern wie ehrliche, manchmal fast rohe Augenblicke eines Lebens, das plötzlich eine andere Richtung nehmen musste.
Besonders berührend ist, wie Vergangenheit und Gegenwart ineinanderfließen. Alte Liebesbriefe tauchen wieder auf, Erinnerungen werden neu betrachtet und dazwischen stehen Paul Austers Briefe an seinen Enkel, die eine leise, fast zärtliche Zukunftsperspektive eröffnen. Dadurch entsteht ein sehr intimes Bild einer außergewöhnlichen Partnerschaft, die mehr als vier Jahrzehnte getragen hat.
Die Sprache ist ruhig, reflektiert und voller feiner Beobachtungen. Kein dramatisches Pathos, sondern eine kluge und sehr menschliche Annäherung an Verlust, Liebe und Erinnerung. Genau diese Zurückhaltung macht das Buch so eindringlich.
Manchmal wirkt der Text fast essayistisch und verlangt Aufmerksamkeit, doch gerade darin liegt seine Kraft. Dieses Buch liest man nicht einfach schnell durch. Es begleitet einen eine Weile und bleibt noch lange im Kopf, wie eine Stimme aus einem anderen Raum.
Ghost Stories von Siri Hustvedt fühlt sich an wie ein stiller Raum voller Erinnerungen, in dem jede Bewegung eine neue Spur freilegt. Schon nach wenigen Seiten entsteht das Gefühl, einem zutiefst persönlichen Tagebuch beizuwohnen, das zugleich weit über eine einzelne Beziehung hinausweist.
Der Verlust von Paul Auster steht im Mittelpunkt dieses Buches, doch es geht um viel mehr als Trauer. Hustvedt schreibt über die seltsame Gegenwart eines Menschen, der nicht mehr da ist und doch überall spürbar bleibt. In Kleidungsstücken, in Gerüchen, in Büchern, in Worten. Diese Momente wirken nicht wie literarische Konstruktionen, sondern wie ehrliche, manchmal fast rohe Augenblicke eines Lebens, das plötzlich eine andere Richtung nehmen musste.
Besonders berührend ist, wie Vergangenheit und Gegenwart ineinanderfließen. Alte Liebesbriefe tauchen wieder auf, Erinnerungen werden neu betrachtet und dazwischen stehen Paul Austers Briefe an seinen Enkel, die eine leise, fast zärtliche Zukunftsperspektive eröffnen. Dadurch entsteht ein sehr intimes Bild einer außergewöhnlichen Partnerschaft, die mehr als vier Jahrzehnte getragen hat.
Die Sprache ist ruhig, reflektiert und voller feiner Beobachtungen. Kein dramatisches Pathos, sondern eine kluge und sehr menschliche Annäherung an Verlust, Liebe und Erinnerung. Genau diese Zurückhaltung macht das Buch so eindringlich.
Manchmal wirkt der Text fast essayistisch und verlangt Aufmerksamkeit, doch gerade darin liegt seine Kraft. Dieses Buch liest man nicht einfach schnell durch. Es begleitet einen eine Weile und bleibt noch lange im Kopf, wie eine Stimme aus einem anderen Raum.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Dieses Buch, in dem Siri H. ihre Geschichte erzählt, ist wunderschön und herzzerreißend: die Geschichte ihrer Begegnung mit Paul A., ihres gemeinsamen Lebens und ihres Lebens nach seinem Tod.
Daneben wird die Geschichte der Vereinigten Staaten erzählt und wie die Politik eine grundlegende Rolle im Leben und in den Geschichten dieser beiden Autoren gespielt hat (die zu meinen Lieblingsautoren gehören, wobei ich sie mehr mag als ihn).
Oft musste ich das Hören unterbrechen, weil mir schlecht wurde, teils wegen der Schmerzen, teils weil der Niedergang von Paul Auster parallel zum Niedergang der Demokratie verlief.
Bellissimo e straziante questo libro dove Siri H. racconta la sua storia, quella del suo incontro con Paul A., la loro vita assieme e quella di lei dopo la sua morte.
Parallelamente la storia degli Stati Uniti e di come la politica abbia avuto un ruolo fondamentale nella vita e nelle storie di questi due autori (tra i miei preferiti e tra i due lei piú di lui).
Spesso ho dovuto interrompere l'ascolto perché mi stavo sentendo male, un po' per il dolore un po' perché il declino di Paul Auster scorreva parallelo a quello della democrazia.
Ich habe vom Verlag ein kostenloses digitales Vorab-Exemplar des Buches im Austausch für eine ehrliche Rezension erhalten.
Daneben wird die Geschichte der Vereinigten Staaten erzählt und wie die Politik eine grundlegende Rolle im Leben und in den Geschichten dieser beiden Autoren gespielt hat (die zu meinen Lieblingsautoren gehören, wobei ich sie mehr mag als ihn).
Oft musste ich das Hören unterbrechen, weil mir schlecht wurde, teils wegen der Schmerzen, teils weil der Niedergang von Paul Auster parallel zum Niedergang der Demokratie verlief.
Bellissimo e straziante questo libro dove Siri H. racconta la sua storia, quella del suo incontro con Paul A., la loro vita assieme e quella di lei dopo la sua morte.
Parallelamente la storia degli Stati Uniti e di come la politica abbia avuto un ruolo fondamentale nella vita e nelle storie di questi due autori (tra i miei preferiti e tra i due lei piú di lui).
Spesso ho dovuto interrompere l'ascolto perché mi stavo sentendo male, un po' per il dolore un po' perché il declino di Paul Auster scorreva parallelo a quello della democrazia.
Ich habe vom Verlag ein kostenloses digitales Vorab-Exemplar des Buches im Austausch für eine ehrliche Rezension erhalten.
Review of advance copy received from Edelweiss+
Author Siri Hustvedt has written one of the most achingly beautiful memoirs that details the grief of her husband's death. Hustvedt married fellow author Paul Auster in 1982 until his death from cancer in 2024. She writes how "grief unmoors us from time" and how we as humans tend to anchor ourselves to those we love, and asks what happens to that anchor when set free. Not just a memoir, this book is also a mediation on the cost of love.
* I read an advance copy and was not compensated.
* I read an advance copy and was not compensated.
Review of advance copy received from Sonstiges
Zum Heulen
March 19, 2026
Absolute Empfehlung!
Review of advance copy
Selten hat mich ein Buch so bewegt. Ich bin mir sicher, dass ich es noch viele Male zur Hand nehmen werde.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews