It's "The Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. I found it on Chapters.ca under "Heather's Picks". It's an older book (first published in Canada in 2005). I read the fabulous reviews that customers posted online about it, so I added it to my list. When Chapters had their "Buy 3 Get 1 Free" promotion last week, I picked it up.
The book takes place in Barcelona, and is about a boy (Daniel) who finds a book titled "The Shadow of the Wind" by an author named Julian Carax. Daniel sets out to find more books by the same author, only to find that someone has been systematically destroying every book that Carax ever wrote. It's a who-dunnit mystery with a bit of romance and intrigue thrown in. It was originally written in Spanish, and has been translated to English.
I absolutely loved the book. I couldn't put it down! The story was beautifully written and sucked me in right from the beginning. The parallels between the Daniel character and the Julian Carax character were intriguing, and it left me guessing as to what was going to happen. It's not often a book surprises me, but this one did, and in a good way. Having been to Barcelona myself, I had the added pleasure of knowing some of the places that the author spoke about in the book. The book is a true literary work of fiction, and I am amazed that it was not originally written in English.
I give Shadow of the Wind 4 1/2 stars out of 5.
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