Levels of Life

The first thing about this book you should know is that it's non-fiction. Well, I think most of it is. I think maybe the middle level is fictionalized history.

Anyway, the first two sections of this slim volume peruse hot air ballooning, photography, love, and the last section, the longest, is a meditation on Barnes' experience of being a widower. I'm sure that my book club could probably explain how it all ties together, although the NPR review isn't sure that it does hang together. The third part is a very intense and could stand on its own as a brief autobiographical novella, or whatever noun might work here. I preferred Barnes' The Sense of an Ending.