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The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, Lucia Graves (Translator)

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Why we're reading this: Mystery Category: November Book Read
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November-Mystery: The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz-Zafon--Spoiler Free
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Anne Valerie

(page 121 of 487)
— Nov 11, 2009 03:23AM

what members thought

Sep 26, 2008

Alethea rated it:

(review of isbn 1596061669)

bookshelves: audiobook, autographed, book-lovers, creepy, favorites, fiction, literary, love, page-turner, sexy, tearjerker, top-10-of-2008, what-a-twist

Read in September, 2008

recommended to Alethea by: random customer who wishes Zafon's newest novel were in Englis
recommends it for: book lovers

-*-The item pictured above is a special edition--I haven't received it yet! It comes out at the end of the year. I can't wait to see it.-*-

Wow. A must-read for book lovers, all the way to the Dramatis Personae at the end. Sumptuous prose and melodrama, a full cavalcade of carefully wrought characters, suspense, romance, gothic horror and best of all, it is read on CD by my new favorite audiobook reader, Jonathan Davis. (He also reads The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.) If I ever l...more

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3 comments

Apr 02, 2009

jzhunagev rated it:

(review of isbn 0753821206)

bookshelves: award-winning-best-seller, fiction-contemporary, historical-fiction, horror, mystery, romance-love-story, suspense, thriller

Read in April, 2009

The novel, set in post-Spanish civil war Barcelona, concerns a young boy, Daniel Sempere. Just after the war, Daniel's father takes him to the secret “Cemetery of Forgotten Books”, a huge library of old, forgotten titles lovingly preserved by a select few initiates. According to tradition, everyone initiated to this secret place is allowed to take one book from it, and must protect it for life. Daniel selects a book called “The Shadow of the Wind” by Julian Carax.

The novel...more The novel, set in post-Spanish civil war Barcelona, concerns a young boy, Daniel Sempere. Just after the war, Daniel's father takes him to the secret “Cemetery of Forgotten Books”, a huge library of old, forgotten titles lovingly preserved by a select few initiates. According to tradition, everyone initiated to this secret place is allowed to take one book from it, and must protect it for life. Daniel selects a book called “The Shadow of the Wind” by Julian Carax.

The novel is rare, the author obscure, and rumors tell of a horribly disfigured man who has been burning every copy he can find of Carax's novels. The man calls himself Lain Coubert—the name of the devil in one of Carax's novels. As he grows up, Daniel's fascination with the mysterious Carax links him to a blind girl with a “porcelain gaze”, Clara Barcelo; another fan, a leftist jack-of-all-trade, Fermin Romero de Torres; his best friend's sister, the delectable Beatriz Aguilar; and as he begins investigating the life and death of Carax, a cast of characters with secrets to hide. In doing so Daniel becomes entangled in an age old conflict that began with the author himself. Many parallels are found to exist between the author's life and Daniel's and he takes it upon himself to make sure history does not repeat itself.

Daniel is believably awkward teenager—compassionate, but naive and romantically inept. Unfortunately as Daniel grows, his character does not, but luckily, Fermin, a homeless man whom Daniel's father hires off the street to work in his bookshop, has enough charisma for the both of them. An ex-secret agent and unattractive lady's man, who works his way through pinching bottoms and solving mysteries. His depth of character, wit coupled with a totured past as a prisoner of war, makes him one of the main redeeming factors in the story.

Fans of the classics will find the tale utterly compelling with its magical interweaving of fate, time and romance, and Zafon's knack for mapping out every inch of scene through a liquid flow of words. But despite the completely original story line, more contemporary readers might be turned off by its verbose nature and unplausibility. Prostitutes are sweethearts, homeless men are brilliant heroes, the hatter is mad...well...as a hatter and Barcelona seems conveniently no more than two blocks wide.

There's no denying, however, that Zafon has a wonderful knack for pushing and pulling his reader's attention. Cliffhanger chapter endings are sprinkled throughout the book. Fittingly for such a celebration of the imagination was the translation done by Lucia Graves who somehow retained the language and the intricate mood. In fact everything about “The Shadow of the Wind” is smooth. The language purrs along, while the plot twists and unravels with languid grace.

Yet despite all these strengths, I felt that there are still loose ends in the book that has not been resolved. Why is it, up until the last end, are the people who knows about that Julian and Penelope are biological brothers and sisters (the book's ultimate twist in its arsenal) are still bent on keeping the truth from Julian? Even Daniel is complicit in this though I considered him the redeeming light of Julian back from his true cheery self. I know it would devastate Julian big time if he would know as such, but the book or its author doesn't seem to deliver a more credible resolution and left it at that.

Zafon's novel is atmospheric, beguiling and throughly readable, but ultimately lacks the magic its early chapter promises. For that I'll give it three and a half stars.(less)

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