Shadow of the Wind
April 20th 2008 19:39
It has been a long time since I have been confused by a novel, but Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s Shadow of the Wind has done just that.
At first we seem promised of an important journey taken by a young boy as his father leads him to a magical, secret place, ‘The Cemetery of Forgotten Books’ where he is free to discover for himself that one special book. This is Barcelona, 1940’s and among the Quatres, Plazas and Casas we become hopeful of being drawn into an exotic world of literature and folklore.
But before long, I found myself enmeshed in a who-dunnit mystery with villains, victims and bystanders coming and going so fast my head spun. Our young hero, Daniel, is not only embroiled in his own life’s traumas, but those of the author Julian Carax, an elusive character whose books are being tracked down and destroyed by a mysteriously cloaked ghost-like figure that appears around corners and in shadows.
I was loathed to be drawn into the many suspects with their accusations and black pasts, as I am not a lover the mystery genre. They tend to be story driven novels with weak characters and little interests me in the way of clues and findings.
I did persevere, but there was small reward in the form of a very long letter delivered to Daniel that told all in its entirety … yes, in just a few chapters we learnt everything … who died, who lived, who killed and who still wanders this world in pain and misery. And to gain all this information, all you had to was read on – no hidden clues or tricky twists, just a simple letter spelling it all out for us.
My disappointment was complete. If I was going to read a mystery, I at least wanted a little complexity in the outcomes – I don’t want to be spoon-fed.
Now, I don’t know how much was lost in translation (translated from Spanish by Lucia Graves), but be it a mystery, love story, coming-of-age or international intrigue, Shadow failed to deliver anything other than a confusion of styles that left me … well, as I said earlier, confused??
| 50 |
| Vote |
Shared on
Add To: 
Subscribe to this blog
