La sombra del viento by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

While women tended to be described as angel and men devil, most characters held both in different shades. Clara is a physical angel who is blind while Fumero an emotional devil blinded by hate. Themes of devils and angels are prevalent as characters save and ruin each others' lives. The sad thing is I believed Julian's love for Penelope as it grew in obsession more than Daniel's love for Beatriz which seemed a happy chance of lust. We are the puppets of our subconscious desires.' But while the message is clear that we chose our own fate, it seems there was no fate but failure for Julian. Is it because Daniel consciously chooses to chance his path or has fate dealt him a better hand? Julian wrote 'There are no coincidences.

Once Daniel is aware of the correlation, the comparison stops. As Julian's story unfolds, Daniel unwittingly finds himself in the exact same point of their duel destiny. Both grew up poor without an ideal family life, fell in love with a rich girl who was the adoration of her father and whose brother was a best friend, evoked murderous anger from her father after impregnating her, and when they have a brush with death, extremes of hate and love anchored their fight to survive.

Just as the fictitious novel was an echo of the book and Julian's life, I loved watching Daniel's life parallel Julian's. It was with much thought that the word was scattered throughout the book. Every time the word shadow was used I considered its illusion of death. For death is not always the worst thing that can happen ('words are not always the worst prison'). In this sense death becomes a fate we chose ourselves. Every character had shadows which could engulf them or they could overcome. Shadow is a perfect symbol for death evoking images of how death can be metaphorical instead of literal-living shadows of lives, chasing shadows of dreams, being shadows of others, letting memories shadow life. Wrapped up in the mystery is a message of death: do we live a full life or wander through it numb? The Shadow of the Wind is an allegory for death in a fictitious novel by the same title. As the story twists and slowly unravels he doesn't know whose account to trust or how it will affect his life. Daniel embarks on a mission to solve the mystery of the author's story being watched by a revengeful cop and the book burner himself. The strange author died in poverty but now someone is seeking out all remaining copies of his unsuccessful novels to burn. He choses a novel-or maybe it chose him-that touches him, stirs his desire for literature, and forever entangles him with the fate of the book and its author. I wanted to read this in Spanish for the rich poetry the language would add.Ī young boy Daniel is taken by his father to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books and told to salvage a book which he must take stewardship over. I needed a whole pad of post-its to mark quotes.ģ. I read the opening few pages and instantly knew 3 things:Ģ.

La sombra del viento by Carlos Ruiz Zafón