Carlos Ruiz Zafon, author of The Shadow of the Wind, and The Angel’s Game.
I think I’ve figured out why I am just now learning about the fantabulous works of author Carlos Ruiz Zafón. At the time that his novel The Shadow of the Wind enjoyed a year-long run on the bestseller lists in Spain in 2001, and then later duplicated that success in corners all around the global village, I was eyebrow-deep in research for Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance. That means I means I missed it when Stephen King described the book as “one gorgeous read”; when Elle Magazine called it “diabolically good”; and when readers in Germany began to celebrate the phenomenon of “Zafónmania.”
In fact, I only learned about it after receiving an offer for an advanced reading copy of Zafón’s most recent novel, The Angel’s Game . As much as I love angels and as curious as I was about the divine shenanigans implied by the title, I was so captivated by enclosed blurbs for The Shadow of the Wind that I had to find a copy of it before I would consider accepting the advanced copy of The Angel’s Game.
So how was I to know that the novel would absorb my imagination-charged attention so completely that I would miss deadlines and forget to pay bills until I had not only read and brooded over its pages but cranked out a full essay on it presented here at Red Room and a condensed version posted as a review on Amazon and other sites? Not the kind of thing you can prepare for. The magic happens and you just say-Wow!
For the Unexpurgated Review of Carlos Ruiz Zafón’s The Shadow of the Wind please click here
For the condensed review on Amazon, click this link
I hope you enjoy it.
by Aberjhani
Bridge of Silver Wings 2023 