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The Shadow of the Wind (The Cemetery of Forgotten Books) Paperback – Illustrated, February 1, 2005
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“Wondrous...masterful...The Shadow of the Wind is ultimately a love letter to literature, intended for readers as passionate about storytelling as its young hero.” —Entertainment Weekly, Editor's Choice
“This is one gorgeous read.” —Stephen King
"I still remember the day my father took me to the Cemetary of Forgotten Books for the first time..."
Barcelona, 1945: A city slowly heals in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, and Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer’s son who mourns the loss of his mother, finds solace in a mysterious book entitled The Shadow of the Wind, by one Julián Carax. But when he sets out to find the author’s other works, he makes a shocking discovery: someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book Carax has written. In fact, Daniel may have the last of Carax’s books in existence. Soon Daniel’s seemingly innocent quest opens a door into one of Barcelona’s darkest secrets—an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love.
- Print length487 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherPenguin Books
- Publication dateFebruary 1, 2005
- Dimensions5.49 x 1.05 x 8.38 inches
- ISBN-100143034901
- ISBN-13978-0143034902
- Lexile measure990L
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Editorial Reviews
Review
“Gabriel Garcia Marquez meets Umberto Eco meets Jorge Luis Borges for a sprawling magic show....We are taken on a wild ride that executes its hairpin bends with breathtaking lurches.” —The New York Times Book Review
"Once again I have encountered a book that proves how wonderful it is to become immersed in a rich, long novel...This novel has it all: seduction, danger, revenge, and a mystery that the author teases with mastery. Zafon has outdone even the mighty Charles Dickens." —The Philadelphia Inquirer
“Anyone who enjoys novels that are scary, erotic, touching, tragic and thrilling should rush right out to the nearest bookstore and pick up The Shadow of the Wind. Really, you should.” —Michael Dirda, The Washington Post
“Wonderous . . . masterful . . . The Shadow of the Wind is ultimately a love letter to literature, intended for readers as passionate about storytelling as its young hero.” —Entertainment Weekly, Editor's Choice
About the Author
Lucia Graves is the author and translator of many works and has overseen Spanish-language editions of the poetry of her father, Robert Graves.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
"It says here that this copy is part of an edition of twenty-five hundred printed in Barcelona by Cabestany Editores, in June 1936."
"Do you know the publishing house?"
"It closed down years ago. But, wait, this is not the original. The first edition came out in November 1935 but was printed in Paris....Published by Galiano & Neuval. Doesn't ring a bell."
"So is this a translation?"
"It doesn't say so. From what I can see, the text must be the original one."
"A book in Spanish, first published in France?"
"It's not that unusual, not in times like these," my father put in. "Perhaps Barceló can help us...."
Gustavo Barceló was an old colleague of my father's who now owned a cavernous establishment on Calle Fernando with a commanding position in the city's secondhand-book trade. Perpetually affixed to his mouth was an unlit pipe that impregnated his person with the aroma of a Persian market. He liked to describe himself as the last romantic, and he was not above claiming that a remote line in his ancestry led directly to Lord Byron himself. As if to prove this connection, Barceló fashioned his wardrobe in the style of a nineteenth-century dandy. His casual attire consisted of a cravat, white patent leather shoes, and a plain glass monocle that, according to malicious gossip, he did not remove even in the intimacy of the lavatory. Flights of fancy aside, the most significant relative in his lineage was his begetter, an industrialist who had become fabulously wealthy by questionable means at the end of the nineteenth century. According to my father, Gustavo Barceló was, technically speaking, loaded, and his palatial bookshop was more of a passion than a business. He loved books unreservedly, and-although he denied this categorically-if someone stepped into his bookshop and fell in love with a tome he could not afford, Barceló would lower its price, or even give it away, if he felt that the buyer was a serious reader and not an accidental browser. Barceló also boasted an elephantine memory allied to a pedantry that matched his demeanor and the sonority of his voice. If anyone knew about odd books, it was he. That afternoon, after closing the shop, my father suggested that we stroll along to the Els Quatre Gats, a café on Calle Montsió, where Barceló and his bibliophile knights of the round table gathered to discuss the finer points of decadent poets, dead languages, and neglected, moth-ridden masterpieces.
Els Quatre Gats was just a five-minute walk from our house and one of my favorite haunts. My parents had met there in 1932, and I attributed my one-way ticket into this world in part to the old café's charms. Stone dragons guarded a lamplit façade anchored in shadows. Inside, voices seemed shaded by the echoes of other times. Accountants, dreamers, and would-be geniuses shared tables with the specters of Pablo Picasso, Isaac Albéniz, Federico García Lorca, and Salvador Dalí. There any poor devil could pass for a historical figure for the price of a small coffee.
"Sempere, old man," proclaimed Barceló when he saw my father come in. "Hail the prodigal son. To what do we owe the honor?"
"You owe the honor to my son, Daniel, Don Gustavo. He's just made a discovery."
"Well, then, pray come and sit down with us, for we must celebrate this ephemeral event," he announced.
"Ephemeral?" I whispered to my father.
"Barceló can express himself only in frilly words," my father whispered back. "Don't say anything, or he'll get carried away."
The lesser members of the coterie made room for us in their circle, and Barceló, who enjoyed flaunting his generosity in public, insisted on treating us.
"How old is the lad?" inquired Barceló, inspecting me out of the corner of his eye.
"Almost eleven," I announced.
Barceló flashed a sly smile.
"In other words, ten. Don't add on any years, you rascal. Life will see to that without your help."
A few of his chums grumbled in assent. Barceló signaled to a waiter of such remarkable decrepitude that he looked as if he should be declared a national landmark.
"A cognac for my friend Sempere, from the good bottle, and a cinnamon milk shake for the young one-he's a growing boy. Ah, and bring us some bits of ham, but spare us the delicacies you brought us earlier, eh? If we fancy rubber, we'll call for Pirelli tires."
The waiter nodded and left, dragging his feet.
"I hate to bring up the subject," Barceló said, "but how can there be jobs? In this country nobody ever retires, not even after they're dead. Just look at El Cid. I tell you, we're a hopeless case."
He sucked on his cold pipe, eyes already scanning the book in my hands. Despite his pretentious façade and his verbosity, Barceló could smell good prey the way a wolf scents blood.
"Let me see," he said, feigning disinterest. "What have we here?"
I glanced at my father. He nodded approvingly. Without further ado, I handed Barceló the book. The bookseller greeted it with expert hands. His pianist's fingers quickly explored its texture, consistency, and condition. He located the page with the publication and printer's notices and studied it with Holmesian flair. The rest watched in silence, as if awaiting a miracle, or permission to breathe again.
"Carax. Interesting," he murmured in an inscrutable tone.
I held out my hand to recover the book. Barceló arched his eyebrows but gave it back with an icy smile.
"Where did you find it, young man?"
"It's a secret," I answered, knowing that my father would be smiling to himself. Barceló frowned and looked at my father. "Sempere, my dearest old friend, because it's you and because of the high esteem I hold you in, and in honor of the long and profound friendship that unites us like brothers, let's call it at forty duros, end of story."
"You'll have to discuss that with my son," my father pointed out. "The book is his."
Barceló granted me a wolfish smile. "What do you say, laddie? Forty duros isn't bad for a first sale....Sempere, this boy of yours will make a name for himself in the business."
The choir cheered his remark. Barceló gave me a triumphant look and pulled out his leather wallet. He ceremoniously counted out two hundred pesetas, which in those days was quite a fortune, and handed them to me. But I just shook my head. Barceló scowled.
"Dear boy, greed is most certainly an ugly, not to say mortal, sin. Be sensible. Call me crazy, but I'll raise that to sixty duros, and you can open a retirement fund. At your age you must start thinking of the future."
I shook my head again. Barceló shot a poisonous look at my father through his monocle.
"Don't look at me," said my father. "I'm only here as an escort."
Barceló sighed and peered at me closely.
"Let's see, junior. What is it you want?"
"What I want is to know who Julián Carax is and where I can find other books he's written."
Barceló chuckled and pocketed his wallet, reconsidering his adversary.
"Goodness, a scholar. Sempere, what do you feed the boy?"
The bookseller leaned toward me confidentially, and for a second I thought he betrayed a look of respect that had not been there a few moments earlier.
"We'll make a deal," he said. "Tomorrow, Sunday, in the afternoon, drop by the Ateneo library and ask for me. Bring your precious find with you so that I can examine it properly, and I'll tell you what I know about Julián Carax. Quid pro quo."
"Quid pro what?"
"Latin, young man. There's no such thing as dead languages, only dormant minds. Paraphrasing, it means that you can't get something for nothing, but since I like you, I'm going to do you a favor."
The man's oratory could kill flies in midair, but I suspected that if I wanted to find out anything about Julián Carax, I'd be well advised to stay on good terms with him. I proffered my most saintly smile in delight at his Latin outpourings.
"Remember, tomorrow, in the Ateneo," pronounced the bookseller. "But bring the book, or there's no deal."
"Fine."
Our conversation slowly merged into the murmuring of the other members of the coffee set. The discussion turned to some documents found in the basement of El Escorial that hinted at the possibility that Don Miguel de Cervantes had in fact been the nom de plume of a large, hairy lady of letters from Toledo. Barceló seemed distracted, not tempted to claim a share in the debate. He remained quiet, observing me from his fake monocle with a masked smile. Or perhaps he was only looking at the book I held in my hands.
Product details
- Publisher : Penguin Books (February 1, 2005)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 487 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0143034901
- ISBN-13 : 978-0143034902
- Lexile measure : 990L
- Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
- Dimensions : 5.49 x 1.05 x 8.38 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #10,122 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #95 in Contemporary Literature & Fiction
- #1,074 in Literary Fiction (Books)
- #1,711 in Suspense Thrillers
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Carlos Ruiz Zafón is the author of six novels, including the international phenomenon The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game, the first two books in a series of novels set in literary universe of The Cemetery of Forgotten Books. His work has been published in more than forty different languages, and honored with numerous international awards. He divides his time between Barcelona, Spain, and Los Angeles, California.
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Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
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The setting is 1940s and 1950s Barcelona (with side trips to Paris). The author has captured the feel of post civil-war, post world war II Spain perfectly. And, as a bonus, there is a tour map with pictures and guiding narrative at the end of the book for those who want to trace the steps of the book's characters as they lived in this story.
Some of the over-intellectualizing critics here (see the very few negative reviews) kind of miss the point. This is a great story, written by a very talented story-teller, filled with wonderfully developed and interesting characters. Is it literature? Is War and Peace literature? Is Madame Bovary? Is anything written by ANY modern author literature? We all know Dan Brown does not write literature - he writes outlines for screen plays, for instance. I actually don't care. I loved this story and the way it was written.
There are innumerable lines to underline and ponder. "Telling the truth should be kept as a last resort, Daniel, even more so to a nun," spoken on Page 253 by my favorite character in the book, the hilarious Fermin Romero de Torres. Or, "The most efficient way of rendering the poor harmless is to teach them to imitate the rich," page 198. And, "...what destiny does not do is home visits. You have to go for it," page 225.
Most of the negative reviews omit to say that this book is hilarious, time and time again. It is also sad, filled with pathos and violent in places. One sees both the good and terrible side of men and women.
The story bogs down somewhat during the long narrative by Nuria Monfort, where we learn important details of the various mysteries and intrigues central to the unraveling of the story. At times here and elsewhere in the book the writing suffers from what I would call TMI (too much information), when less would be better. The story is complicated as are the players, but all to the better. The reader has to "work" a little bit to catch on to the threads of the story, but in the last analysis the mystery is not so hard to solve. Any astute reader can be well ahead of the story teller here, but that does not ruin anything.
I do not really know what a gothic novel is, but apparently this is a modern version of "romance mixed with horror." The romance part vastly overshadows the horror part in this story. But the horror is quite graphic and sufficient. The evil character is indeed evil. It's hard to decide who the central character is" Daniel or Julian, as their lives and personalities become intertwined.
My major criticism focuses on my confusion about the "voice" of the story. Who really is the narrator? Ostensibly it is Daniel, but...............there are many pages where other voices take center stage. At times I had to read 3 or 4 pages of these other "voices" before I was sure about exactly who was "talking." Carlos Ruiz Zafon does not have as big a problem as Arturo Perez-Reverte about "voice of the story," but Zafon confused me at times.
There really is no denouement. Like all good, real stories, all of the players and themes simply merge together at the end, and the epilogues finish off any further questions a reader might have. I found the ending very satisfying.
"The Shadow of the Wind" is an enormously pleasurable read. If there were "in between" categories, I would give it a 4.6, but I'll round up the rating to a 5. And happy to do so.
As far as the plot, Daniel Sempere, a young boy, is first introduced to the world of books when his father takes him to the mysterious Cemetery of Forgotten Books. Choosing a novel entitled The Shadow of the Wind by Julian Carax, Daniel sets into motion fate and destiny. Upon learning that someone is going great lengths to destroy every copy of this author’s works, Daniel goes on a quest to search for this mysterious author and understand his life. Along the way, Daniel experiences love, and learns more about himself as a person and the puzzle of Carax. There’s something foreboding—and intriguing—about the possession of this book and it opens to the door to many mysteries of the past and present: forbidden love, unforeseen danger.
For the most part, Zafon’s novel has a compelling, mysterious, enchanting quality, one that engages and interests the reader from the start. I also enjoyed some of the minor characters too, especially Nuria Monfort, who is a complex character who adds much depth to the story, especially as Daniel unravels several mysteries.
Not all is perfect with the novel, however, and the book loses some of its mystical quality at certain points. Much of this comes when Daniel’s sidekick, Fermin, comes into the story. Fermin offers some comic relief, but has a court jester-like quality to him. He is initially fun, but becomes annoying as the novel progresses, and seems to “dumb down” and lessen the intrigue factor. Another issue is with the over-the-top villainy, so overdone that I could literally envision the main antagonist twisting his mustache with his fingers all the while plotting and laughing maniacally. Some of the male characters, particularly the fathers of the children, are carbon copies of each other, almost interchangeable.
This aside, though, The Shadow of the Wind is well worth the read, a book I highly recommend for those who like mystery, suspense or the Gothic tradition. It’s also a book about books, another plus in my, ahem, book. It’s a novel that pulls you in, and makes you interested in the protagonist’s fate. As other have attested, this is a book encompassing so many elements and themes that it has a wide range of appeal. There’s something for everyone in this reading experience.
Top reviews from other countries
Could only give it a 4 out of 5.
But the book did not come in perfect shape, scrapes were found along the edges of the cover (on the bottom side), since it was not protected inside the package.
Hopefully they will pack books a bit better so that they don’t scrape up in transit.
The Shadow of the Wind
By Carlos Ruiz Zafon
This is a book about a book lover. Set in 1930’s Barcelona, Spain, a 10-year-old Daniel Sempre accompanies his father to the Cemetery of Forgotten books where he picks up a book by Julian Carax. Daniel is immediately captured by the book and sets on a mission to find out more about the author only to discover that somebody has been systematically destroying all his books. This book will capture you, charm you and haunt you with a riveting storyline that’ll keep you guessing and continue reading.
The things I loved
1. The Plot Line – It’s a story that got me hooked from the first chapter. This book will force you to stay up all night until you reach the end. The main plotline of the book is intriguing and provides a satisfying ending. Even the subplots in the book have subplots!
2. The Writing – The book is artistically and skillfully written with vivid descriptions. The way in which the story unfolds is onion-like and will engross you. The description of Barcelona in the book made me want to pack my bags, hop on a plane and visit all the places described in the book. The book is filled with quotes and thoughts (which made it hard to choose my favorite quote from the book). I m definitely going to read more books by this author.
3. The Characters and their arcs – Each character in the book goes through a journey and develops as the book moves forward. Each of them had their own eccentricities and I could connect and empathise with them. Apart from the main character, my favorite character was Fermin.
4. The Setting – The book is set in 1930-1940’s Barcelona, right after the civil war, and has a gothic spin to it. This makes the book interesting and even scary at times. The Aldaya mansion haunted me.
What didn’t work for me-
1. The Female Characters – The female characters in the book are either delicate, beautiful and sexy or they are ugly hags. This is something I didn’t like.
2. Descriptive Writing – I do not mind descriptive and romantic writing but there are people who find it off putting. If you are one of those, then this is a con for you.
Follow me for more book reviews on Instagram at - @read.review.rate
Reviewed in Canada on July 7, 2020
The Shadow of the Wind
By Carlos Ruiz Zafon
This is a book about a book lover. Set in 1930’s Barcelona, Spain, a 10-year-old Daniel Sempre accompanies his father to the Cemetery of Forgotten books where he picks up a book by Julian Carax. Daniel is immediately captured by the book and sets on a mission to find out more about the author only to discover that somebody has been systematically destroying all his books. This book will capture you, charm you and haunt you with a riveting storyline that’ll keep you guessing and continue reading.
The things I loved
1. The Plot Line – It’s a story that got me hooked from the first chapter. This book will force you to stay up all night until you reach the end. The main plotline of the book is intriguing and provides a satisfying ending. Even the subplots in the book have subplots!
2. The Writing – The book is artistically and skillfully written with vivid descriptions. The way in which the story unfolds is onion-like and will engross you. The description of Barcelona in the book made me want to pack my bags, hop on a plane and visit all the places described in the book. The book is filled with quotes and thoughts (which made it hard to choose my favorite quote from the book). I m definitely going to read more books by this author.
3. The Characters and their arcs – Each character in the book goes through a journey and develops as the book moves forward. Each of them had their own eccentricities and I could connect and empathise with them. Apart from the main character, my favorite character was Fermin.
4. The Setting – The book is set in 1930-1940’s Barcelona, right after the civil war, and has a gothic spin to it. This makes the book interesting and even scary at times. The Aldaya mansion haunted me.
What didn’t work for me-
1. The Female Characters – The female characters in the book are either delicate, beautiful and sexy or they are ugly hags. This is something I didn’t like.
2. Descriptive Writing – I do not mind descriptive and romantic writing but there are people who find it off putting. If you are one of those, then this is a con for you.
Follow me for more book reviews on Instagram at - @read.review.rate