The strangeness of W.G. Sebald's narrative style

More than any other writer, W.G. Sebald works through a series of associations, developing a narrative through an unending sequence or cascades of strange connections, so that in reading his novels you feel, yes, this is all tied together, it all makes sense, but you also feel an odd dislocation - how did I get here? It's as if the gravity changes all around you, and the world you thought you were in suddenly (or gradually?) has a new set of dimensions. To explain, here is a brief summary of the first 100 or so pages (first third) of his most novel-like fiction, "Austerlitz," which begins with narrator (Sebald himself?) describing a time in his life when regularly visited Belgium (he never tells us why - perhaps research for his writing), and on one visit in the Antwerp station waiting room he comes upon a sympathetic figure, Austerlitz, who discusses at great length the train station and other Belgian architecture; they meet again by chance several times in Belgium (Sebald know how unlikely this is), and discuss fortifications; Sebald goes to visit one such, later it became a prison - a strange and scary place, Sebald includes pictures; S. describes that he later moved to Germany, and A. would not respond to his letters; years later, S. losing vision, takes train to London to see specialist, afterwards in train station meets A., again by chance, conversations resume, after some discussion of the Liverpool Street station, A. describes his childhood, long account of miserable family in Wales, his time in boarding school, learning that he is adapted war baby, real name is A., scholarship to Oxford, and his friendship with his servant/fag, Fitzpatrick?, and time with F's family in Wales - an educated family, full of eccentric scholars and collectors. Where is this novel going? Hard to say for first-time reader, but it has that strange, almost hypnotic qualities of a long train journey, and you feel you're always in the hands of a great thinker, a great and entertaining traveling companion, and you'll go along for the ride.