<DIV>So begins the story told by Peter Aaron and his best friend, Benjamin Sachs. Sachs had a marriage Aaron envied, an intelligence he admired, a world he shared. and then suddenly, after a near-fatal fall that might or night not have been intentional, Sachs disappeared. Now Aaron must piece together the life that led to Sach's death. His sole aim is to tell the truth and preserve it, before those who are investigating the case invent an account of their own.<p> <b>Paul Auster's extraordinary seventh novel is about friendship and betrayal, sexual desire and estrangement, and the unpredictable instrusions of violence in the everyday. It is a daring and immensely moving story by an author whom <b>The Times Literary Supplement</b> has called "one of America's most spectacularly inventive writers." </div>