The Shadow of the Wind

Fiction this month for the student services blog...

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
(translated from the Spanish by Lucia Graves)

Set in post-Spanish Civil War Barcelona, The Shadow of the Wind is the story of Daniel Sempere, the son of a bookseller. On his first trip to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, Daniel discovers a little-known novel the obscure author Julián Carax. The novel (entitled The Shadow of the Wind) speaks to Daniel in a way that no other book has. He longs to read more by Carax, but it seems that a mysterious man has been collecting all extant copies of Carax's works and burning them.

The more Daniel learns of Carax, the more questions remain unanswered. As parallels begin to emerge between Carax's life and his own, Daniel becomes all the more invested in discovering the secrets of Carax and the mysterious book-burner.

A spellbinding page-turner rife with well-drawn characters, The Shadow of the Wind is part mystery, part tragedy, part romance. It is a book about books and a book about life.