3.5 stars
Very Faustian and very Gothic. I'd decided to read some of the books that have been hanging around on my TBR for the longest time, this one being among them. I loved The Shadow of the Wind and had always meant to read the following novels. One down, one to go!
The Shadow of the Wind is a hard act to follow and I didn't like this book quite as much. For one thing, I felt like a number of the plot points were recycled from Shadow, the doomed love, the events happening at a building which is later revealed to be a burnt out wreck, things like that. Plus it's awfully obvious who David’s Boss is. I did find myself wondering if Kirsten White had read the Cristina-on-the-frozen-lake scene before she wrote The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein.
Zafon was a talented writer and I couldn't help but wonder how much (or how little) his writing process was like David's. All night writing fueled by coffee. They certainly wrote similar subject matter, Gothic intrigue in the streets of Barcelona. I have to say that I felt let down by the ending, despite it's nice circular arrangement with the photo of the young Cristina.
My aim is to read The Prisoner of Heaven before year's end. It remains to be seen if I can squeeze it into my reading queue, probably after October and Halloween Bingo.
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