Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
Jonathan Safran Foer
 The main protagonist of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a nine-year-old boy named Oskar Schell. Oskar Schell's father Thomas Schell dies in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, before the narrative begins. While looking through his father's closet, Oskar finds a key in a small envelope inside a vase, on the outside of the envelope the word "Black" is written in the top left corner. Curious, Oskar sets off on a mission to contact every person in New York City with the last name Black, in alphabetical order, in order to find the lock to the key his father left behind. The novel also tells a separate narrative that eventually converges with the main story through a series of letters written by Oskar's grandfather to Oskar's father and by Oskar's grandmother to Oskar himself. Based on real life events. One of the first people Oskar meets in his search for the key's origin is a forty-eight-year-old woman named Abby Black. Oskar makes friends instantly, but she has no information on the key. Oskar continues to search the city, meeting an old man he calls "the renter" – as he is the new tenant in Oskar's grandmother's apartment; "the renter" is actually Oskar's grandfather. Eight months after he meets Abby he finds a message on the answering machine. He had not touched that phone since his father died since his father's last words had been on an identical answering machine which Oskar had kept hidden from his mother. It is revealed that Abby had called Oskar directly after his visit, saying "[she] wasn't completely honest with [Oskar], and [she] think[s] that [she] might be able to help". Oskar returns to Abby's apartment, and Abby directs him to her ex-husband, William Black. When Oskar talks to William Black, he learns that the vase used to belong to William's father. In his will, William's father left William a key to a safe-deposit box, but William had already sold the vase at the estate sale to Thomas Schell. Oskar tells William something that he "never told anyone" – the story of the last answering machine message Oskar received from his father, during the attack of 9/11- a repetition of the words "Are you there? Are you there? Are you there?" Oskar then gives William Black the key. Disappointed that the key does not belong to him, Oskar goes home angry and sad, not interested in the contents of the box. After Oskar destroys everything that had to do with the search for the lost key, his mother reveals that she knew Oskar was contacting all the Blacks in New York City. After the first few visits she called every Black that he would meet and informed them that Oskar was going to visit and why. In response, the people Oskar met knew ahead of time why he was coming and usually treated him in a friendly manner.