In Touch: The Letters of Paul Bowles

Although Paul Bowles' signature aloofness pervades this collection of letters, In Touch: The Letters of Paul Bowles Edited, is rich with information about his life as a writer and composer, his friendships with Ger-trude Stein and William Burroughs, and his love of travel.

But it's the beauty of Bowles' writing that makes In Touchespecially engaging. A resident of Tangier since the 1930s, Bowles thrives on the allure of the exotic and reflects on American culture with stinging eloquence. This is the most autobiographical book we'll probably ever see from this expatriate American, who wrote that a writer is ''merely a machine for the transmission of ideas a cipher, a blank. A spy sent into life by the forces of death.'' A