The Shadow Of The Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

The Shadow Of The Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

I have just finished reading The Shadow Of The Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon and what a breath taking read it was. I found myself gripped from the very first page of the book right up until the last page. When I first saw The Shadow Of The Wind I wasn't tempted to read it as I thought it looked hard going and rather heavy on historical facts - how wrong I was. I have never been so pleased that I changed my mind about something. Once read The Shadow Of The Wind will instantly go to the top of any reader’s personal list of top ten books. The Shadow Of The Wind was a bestseller in Spain, where the author Carlos Ruiz Zafon grew up and has been sold in over twenty countries throughout the world.

Every chapter within the book held a surprise that captivated me and propelled me to read further into the book. By the end of the book I was on the edge of my seat eager to reach the final page, yet sad that I would be leaving illuminating characters such as Daniel and Julian Carax behind. Although this is a book with words on pages as a reader you become so involved with the book and the characters that you feel like you are watching a movie unfold on a big screen. The author himself says that he has no aspirations for the book to be made into a film.

The Shadow Of The Wind is one of those books that refuse’s to be pigeon holed into a specific genre. It is almost as if the author has gathered together as many ingredients as he could possibly accumulate and thrown them all together into a huge mixing bowl to see what he could create. What Carlos Ruiz Zafon has created is a masterpiece and a fine one at that. In this epic saga we have drama, suspense, love, betrayal, murder, friendship and suffering, all of this created against a backdrop of war.

The book takes the reader on a roller coaster ride of emotions and suspense to hell and back, and then back into the jaws of hell once more. Not a book for the faint hearted. The Shadow Of The Wind is quite a dark book and features much death and carnage, none of which are dwelled are to any great extent. An incident happens, it is discussed and dealt with and then the author moves on to the next twist and turn of the plot.

The book does contain a lot of humour, although quite dark. There are many times when a smile is brought to the face of the reader. Fermin Romero, a key character in the plot of the book and one of the main protagonists offers many profound thoughts throughout the book. Although the character of Fermin has suffered greatly and continues to be persecuted throughout the book he remains one of the brightest and funniest characters. Even after being tortured and imprisoned he isn't frightened of speaking his mind often making light of some very serious situations. Maybe that is his way of coping? Fermin is a brave man and to my mind the hero of the book, perhaps more of a hero than the main character - Daniel. Fermin is found on the streets and is taken in by Daniel and his father, instantly becoming one of the family. We learn as the book progresses that Fermin was hung upside down and tortured with a blow torch, he has been falsely imprisoned on many occasions and he was accused of murder, a charge fabricated by the fearful Inspector Fumero.

The characters, of which there are a large number, effortlessly spring to life within the pages of the book and the obsession of the reader to complete the book and get to the root of the story is nearly as bad as the obsession Daniel has for seeking out the truth about the author Julian Carax and his life.

Daniel is an innocent and perhaps naive child who accidentally opens the biggest can of worms he could possibly find to open when he finds the book The Shadow Of The Wind at the Cemetery of Forgotten Books and takes it home to love and cherish as instructed by his father. Once opened Daniel starts down a path that can only lead to danger, adventure and most of all love. As Daniel's investigations lead him and the people he cares about into more and more trouble it becomes a race against time to bring the whole story to a close. To find out the truth about Julian Carax before it destroys the lives of the people he loves the most.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon writes with passion and emotion and really brings to life the setting and the characters that he weaves into what is quite a complex plot. The story takes many twists and turns - some expected and some real shocks. Right up until the end of the book you are kept guessing how the story will play out and if any of the main protagonists in the book will be left standing.

Daniel and Julian's lives share many similarities but the big question throughout the book is will they both end the same way?

For me this book is about two main issues - love and friendship and the bonds that these two relationships create between people. The story also shows how much people can be traumatised by their upbringing and how class can dominate a person’s life and shape it for the future. Jealousy and envy play a big part in the book as well and are both key to the relationship between Julian and the menacing Inspector Fumero. By the end of the book we are shown though the eyes of Daniel that there can be happy endings yet we are shown through the eyes of Julian that jealousy and greed can lead to much death and great unhappiness.

This book features a love story of epic proportions that transcends the depths of time. It is a love story that can and will only die when all parties concerned pass away. Penelope made the ultimate sacrifice for her love of Julian and he in turn spent his life in turmoil. This love is a forbidden love, forbidden because of lies and treacherous events in the past. To use an old and popular phrase ‘sins of he fathers that have been cruelly passed down to their children’.

Julian, the son of a hatter, is taken in by a rich man who wants to turn him into a success story and offer him the best a rich family can offer or at least that is what we the reader and Julian are lead to believe. Julian meets Penelope, the daughter of the rich man and instantly they fall in love. Both are afraid that their love for one another will be frowned on because of Julian’s modest background and up bringing so they keep their love a secret. One day however Julian and Penelope are caught in a compromising position by her mother who wastes no time in telling her father. Penelope is locked away never to be seen again and Julian is forced to flee his home country in search of refuge in a foreign land. He still longs for his love and hopes to find her again one day.

Sadly Penelope imprisoned in the house and pregnant with a child Julian knows nothing about dies giving birth. Her family listening to her as she screams out in pain, ignoring her cries for help. We are told how Penelope’s parents allowed their own child to bleed to death for her sins. In one graphic scene we are told how on entering the room her parents find her blood smeared all over the walls. It is hard to imagine that parents could be so cruel and could allow their child to die such a cruel death and do nothing to prevent it. We must remember however that this book is set in a different time, a time when cruel and barbaric things did happen all of the time. The death of Penelope highlights the lengths rich families would go to in order to protect the family’s name and status. In actual fact the family ends up with nothing at all, Penelope’s death the downfall of the family.

To add to this unspeakable horror we later learn that Julian’s mother (Sophie) was forced to have a relationship with Penelope’s father; this lead to Sophie having unwanted sex and taking a severe beating at the hands of Penelope’s father. The result of this affair, if you could call it an affair, was that Julian was conceived. Julian and his beloved Penelope were brother and sister. This secret is never revealed to Julian as his friends fear that the truth would kill him. They never reveal how Penelope died either finding it better to avoid the truth. I think this part of the story shows how rich people often think they can take what they want when they want it and do whatever they please with it. In this case Julian’s mother, Sophie, was beaten and burnt by Penelope’s father and forced into a sexual relationship that she did not want or enjoy. Being rich and coming from a rich family meant he had all the power. Sophie had nothing and was therefore powerless against him.

It takes the reader most of the book to discover this horrific truth and that is one thing I love about this book. The author cleverly drip feeds the reader parts of the story keeping the reader hanging for many pages before he reintroduces that part of the story once more. Each time the reader gets just enough of the tale to make their own assumptions about what is going on before they are hurtled literally off in another totally different direction once more.

Loss features heavily in The Shadow Of The Wind. Julian suffers the loss of his beloved Penelope and Daniel the loss of his beloved mother. It is her loss that sets the whole story in motion. Daniel becomes so wrapped up in solving the mystery of Julian’s life that he fears he has lost the image of his mother from his mind forever. A thought that haunts him and makes him pursue his goal with greater urgency and gusto. Daniel truly believes that in solving the puzzle put before him he can regain that all important image of his mother. In fact it is when Daniel gets shot and almost dies that he sees his mother’s image and he is finally at peace.

The Shadow Of The Wind does what many other books fail to do. It unravels a complex story as told by the narrator and in first person. The sections where a specific character tells their part of the story add depth to the book and in many ways make the book seem more real. Without these interjections the book may have stalled but adding them into the book seemed to make the book pick up its pace. As the reader I felt that I was also in a race against time to solve the mystery of Julian’s life.

The second half of the book was where the real action was to be found and more of the plot was revealed to the reader, who could only guess at the ending of the book. The first part of the book set the whole thing in motion and gave us a real insight into Daniel and his life.

My fears that the book might be of a very historical nature due to its setting evaporated quickly. Although the author has created a book set in Barcelona just after the civil war he doesn’t spend much time dwelling on these events. He carefully paints a picture of Spain at that time through the multitude of colourful characters in the book. Fermin probably gives us the best look at Spain during what was a dark and rather brutal time. Nuria also offers a glimpse into what Spain was like during the war in her essay that she leaves for Daniel. An essay that ties up many unanswered questions. It felt like you were hearing first hand what happened to Julian and his friends by reading Nuria’s essay. In those few pages Nuria became a living, breathing person.

I personally liked the way that the story was really two stories woven into one. Daniel’s life shared many similarities with Julian’s and in the end Julian’s demons became Daniel’s. Daniel loved a girl – Bea, who he wasn’t allowed to have in much the same way as Julian had loved Penelope. Although their separations were for different reasons both men were forced to love from a distance. Daniel came out on top in the romance stakes as he eventually overcame the hurdles placed before him and married his sweet heart. Sadly all Julian was left with was a coffin and half truths about Penelope and her still born child.

The devil wears many faces but seems to pop up over and over again throughout the book. Lain Coubert was the devil in Julian Carax’s - The Shadow Of The Wind. Although a fictional character, a man of the same name roamed the streets burning the books of Julian Carax. We later learn that this man is more of a monster as he has no face and his hands are badly deformed. Lain Coubert stalked Daniel and made him fear for his own life and the lives of the people he loved. I had my suspicions early on as to the real identity of Lain Coubert but throughout the plot twists in the book I began to wonder if I was wrong. It wasn’t until the end of the book that the truth was revealed.

To live your life like that seems cruel and heartless. It was as if Julian was being punished time and time again for loving Penelope. The vivid descriptions of Lain Coubert’s face and hands made me feel sick to the core. In one scene Nuria tries to comfort Lain but finds it hard as his face is so disfigured. For me The Phantom Of The Opera sprung to mind when I thought about Lain and his tragic injuries. In many ways it would have been kinder for Julian/Lain to have died in the fire at the warehouse but God seemed determined to keep him alive and to make him suffer.

Jacinta, Penelope’s nanny, sees the devil in her dreams as a man who at first looks like a human then a reptile. He tells Jacinta that she will never have any children but that she will find a child to love who will love her back. It is true that Penelope loves Jacinta as if she is her own mother and always turns to her in her hour of need. Sadly Jacinta pays the price for that love. When Penelope and Julian are found together Jacinta is thrown out of the house never to see her beloved Penelope again. Jacinta is put into a home, which the author takes great pains to describe as nothing short of a living hell. The way that the author described the different settings in the book really made the whole story come to life and leap up off the page.

The main devil in the book is Inspector Fumero, who I feel is worse than the devil. A towering presence he is a man who seems to be above the law and a man who makes up his own rules on life and how it should be lived. As a child we learn he was slightly odd and different from the other boys. His social circumstances made him the butt of other people’s jokes. Falling in love with Penelope was what finally pushed him over the edge and set up a war to the death with Julian Carax, his old school friend. The one person who had treated him with respect. If Fumero couldn’t have Penelope then Julian certainly wasn’t having her either. Anyone who got in Fumero’s way was removed usually by death this included his mother who he shot when still a boy. Fumero didn’t forget his grudge and even though many years had passed by he was still as determined as ever to kill Julian using Daniel and his obsession with the author to lead him to his prey. Fumero was a murderer and a thug. He rose to the position of Inspector by killing anyone who stood in his path, including the previous inspector. He met his death falling through a sky light. Aligning his allegiance with whomever he could, his only real interest - power. He used his authority to terrorise people, murder people, imprison and beat people to a pulp. Fumero’s upbringing and social background appeared to mould him into the devil he would become. The only way he could make a mark in life it seemed was to kill and slay people.

The only person who could end his rain of terror on Barcelona was Julian Carax. In many ways I guess you could say that it was a fight between good (Julian) and evil (Fumero) but Julian had killed people, often with good reason, so was he really any better than Fumero? Julian when challenged to a duel, set up unknowingly by Fumero, with Penelope’s brother and his old school friend didn’t decline and in fact he ended up killing Jorge (something which Fumero had suspected would happen – another of his tactics for drawing Julian out of the wood work). Julian also murdered the boss of Nuria after he cost forced her out of her job.

When all was said and done it was because of Julian that people were being persecuted and murdered like Nuria and Miquel. Yet whilst his friends were dying trying to protect him he hid in the shadows. I guess it was for this reason that I found it hard to like Julian. There were certain things I felt sorry for him about – falling in love with Penelope and then having to flee not knowing what had become of her but he was the one who had let his friends fall in what was his battle. His own battle scars were caused by his own hands not those of Fumero so I had little sympathy for him.

It was very interesting to see how people looked up to Julian like he was some kind of god. Miquel gave his life for Julian without a second thought and Nuria fell in love with Julian and loved him all of her life yet he never loved her in return. Julian would only ever love one woman. Daniel didn’t even know Julian but seemed determined to get to the root of his story and unravel the secrets that he had left behind. At the end even Daniel appears willing to sacrifice his own life for a man he barely knows.

There are many glamorous women in the book – all are portrayed as mystical creatures that entrap their pray with their good looks. Julian just sees Penelope and he is in love and willing to do anything for her. Daniel is besotted by Clara, the blind girl he encounters early on in the book. I guess she is Daniel’s first love although she treats him more like a play thing than a potential lover. There was something about Clara that made me feel uneasy and this uneasiness persisted throughout the book. Nuria again has a dramatic impact on Daniel. Again the way she is described by the author makes her sound too good to be true. Another female character that would be better suited to the big screen. Nuria of course spends her life loving a man who cannot love her back. Out of compassion and perhaps sorrow she marries Miquel but in the end she gives her life over to Julian, dying because of the secrets she refuses to share with Fumero.

I like the way that Carlos Ruiz Zafon portrays his female characters as heroines. I think it is because they seem so perfect that the reader can relate as to why both Daniel and Julian are captivated by them.

There are other more down to earth women in the book like Jacinta, the nanny. I think Carol Ruiz Zafon does a good job of showing the social divides between the many characters in the book. The rich have mansions and lots of money to splash about on fancy schools and statues whilst the poor struggle to stay afloat. At the end of the day who is the happiest? In reflection upon completing the book it almost appears that the characters with little or no money although struggling to get by in life are by far the happiest characters in the book. Clara although comfortably well off never finds a man to settle down with and the Aldaya family, of which Penelope is the daughter, literally destroy themselves over time – perhaps haunted by what they have done? I think that by making some of the females in the book very glamorous and almost too good to be true Carlos Ruiz Zafon highlights quite dramatically the social divides that existed after the war in Spain and still exist in every walk of life today. We are shown through his text whores who provide sex to earn money and we are shown woman that seem almost made of porcelain like Clara who do not need to work to have money.

For me one of the environments in the book that provided the most horrid window into Spain at that time was the home in which Jacinta was forced to live. Men and women, some functioning quite well others with no memory at all crammed into what appeared to be a dirty building in need of restoration and repair. A building that no one else wanted as it had a bad reputation. A place full of the people no one could bare to look at any more. A place to hide the rejects of Spanish society.

My favourite character in the book is Fermin. I half expected him to be dead by the end of the book and was pleased that he was still alive and well as the story ended despite many attempts by Fumero, his nemesis, to kill him. Perhaps Fumero hated Fermin so much because out of all the characters in the book Fermin wasn’t afraid to stand up to him? Fermin was an interesting character. He was funny without trying to be funny and he was loyal. Without knowing what he was getting himself into he was by Daniel’s side every step of the way risking his own life time and time again. Fermin was one of the greatest friends a person could have. Hearing Fermin’s stories about the past and seeing how much he suffered as a result of the torture he endured during those dark days the reader was really shown the full horror of the civil war on a personal level. Maybe it was because Fermin was so likeable that it made the horror he endured so sickening and unbelievable. This was made even worse by the fact that even after he was freed he was still being hunted and taunted. Whilst evil people like Inspector Fumero were alive people like Fermin would never be free from persecution and the threat of death.

There have been many comparisons between the works of the esteemed author Thomas Hardy and The Shadow Of The Window by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. It is true that like many of Thomas Hardy’s stories The Shadow Of The Wind is a dark story but it owes much of that darkness to the period its set in. The story is also very bleak like the stories Thomas Hardy created and full of death but again that can be attributed to the period the book is set in. The civil war may be over but its ghosts continue to haunt the streets of Barcelona like an infection that contaminates every one it meets in its path. Fermin is a prime example of both a casualty and victim of the war.

Looming large on the streets of Barcelona is a man who used the war as a means to an end. Fumero played the role of judge, jury and executioner before, during and after the war. There was it appeared nothing he wouldn’t do for the right price.

In my view this book wouldn’t have worked anywhere near as well had it not been set in the period it was set in and the country it was based. History was not a hindrance in this book as I first feared. It was in fact a valued extra dimension to the book and the characters of the book. Throughout the book you could smell the fear Fumero evoked in people like Fermin and Daniel, you could sense the devastation the war had caused in Barcelona and you could feel the love, that unique and ever lasting bond between Julian and Penelope. A love that would last for all eternity. Even though Penelope was dead and had been dead for many years she still felt very much alive. Her strength and sprit constantly soaring like a phoenix rising from the ashes. Even in death Penelope had an unbridled power of Julian. Perhaps it was that love and the electricity it brought with it that the reader fed off when reading the book?

For me the most prominent image in the book was the angel statue upturned with its hand reaching out in the grounds of the Aldaya mansion, the same hand that would later impale the evil Fumero and see him take his last breath. Throughout the book there were a number of references to the statue. That arm reaching out was for me a symbol of Penelope reaching out, crying out to her lost lover Julian. It seemed only fitting that Fumero should succumb to his death in such a tragic and poetic fashion, impaled on the stone arm. The house had been described as a gothic mansion therefore it was the only place that was fitting for Fumero and Julian to play out their final battle. With Penelope’s body in the room below the house, her presence watching over the proceedings perhaps Julian was always destined to win?

The Shadow Of The Wind was a spell binding read. It was a crime novel and chilling thriller in many respects yet it was also a delicate love story and a story about growing up. Daniel started off his journey a boy of ten and ended the story a man. Julian began his story a young boy at school and ended it a broken man who had lost all of his friends and the love of his life. The one real link between the two – a pen. Nuria bought the pen as a gift for Julian but when times got hard it was sold only for Daniel’s father to buy Daniel the pen years later. At the end of the story in a ghost like incident the pen is returned to Julian. Daniel has given back Julian the remains of his life. In some ways the book did finish on a happy note. The good survived and the evil was killed. Daniel got to marry the love of his life and have a child. Julian defeated his nemesis yet he would never be truly free of his demons. How could a man who had turned himself into a monster ever rebuild his life and live freely in the real world again. It seemed to me that Julian would spend the rest of his life as a shadow in the wind.