The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

I read this book on my own. 490 pages of bliss. I read it in 5 days. And I've been re-reading sections of it over the ensuing week, wanting more of it, wanting to recall the beautiful quotes, re-read the twists and turns, some of which made me gasp aloud. 

I feel this book is reminiscent of A Remembrance of Time Past (by Proust) for its many moments of memories evoked by sounds, smells, etc. Also, it feels like Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities, because this story truly has the "worst of times" and "best of times." War. Atrocities. Coming of age. Young love. Family love. Family abuses. In addition, I felt some 1,001 Nights in this book...because ...so much storytelling. Stories within stories (within stories). Tolstoy did that a lot too, but Tolstoy's tangents got to me, whereas in this book, I *want* (need) to know the stories. 

The setting is Barcelona in the years leading up to Spain's Civil War (1936-39), and then about a decade after the war. 

Daniel is 11 when the book starts. His mom died of cholera when he was 4, so he's been reared by his single dad, a bookseller. One morning, Daniel awakes screaming that he can't remember his mom's face. That's the day his dad brings him to the Cemetery of Lost Books to select one book. Daniel chooses "Shadow of the Wind" by Julian Carax. Daniel falls in love with the writing and wants more of Carax's books, but there are none others in existence. Someone has been buying them up and destroying them. No one knows why. 

We also hear the story of the author's (Julian) young years. His mother, Sophie (nee Carax), his father, a cold man who thinks his son Julian is an idiot because he loves books. Somehow, a rich guy meets Julian, and is impressed by his intelligence, and takes it upon himself to "school the boy." The rich guy sends Julian to a private boys school, and there, Julian befriends boys, a few of whom will change his life. 

The nice thing about this book is that it feels mostly chronological. Rather than bouncing back & forth between the stories of Daniel and Julian. 

There's no way to do this book justice with a short review. I could go on and on. This book is staying with me. I think about it every day since I finished it. I want to read it again...all 490 pages over again. 

+++++

Characters: Julian, Miquel, Daniel, Jorge, Jorge's sister Penelope, Tomas, Tomas' sister Beatriz, Daniel. Fermin, the policeman. The cop puts me in mind of the copper from Les Miserables, who feels compelled to search for the "bad guy" even when he should just let it go. 

The Lions of 5th Avenue, by Fiona Davis

This is our 3rd book by Fiona Davis. The Spectacular, we really liked. The Magnolia Palace, we gave 3.5 (out of 5) stars due to way too much filler. This book had the same "filler" problem, plus it fell flat on character development. For this reason, it gets 3 stars. The draw is its setting of the NYC Library. 

1914----Laura and Jack Lyons have 2 kids, Pearl and Jack, and they live in an apartment inside the NYC library because Jack is the superintendent. Jack is writing a novel, and understandably spends a lot of his free time holed up writing. Laura decides she wants a career too -- apparently she discovers her own flair for writing, though it's not clear if she ever yearned for it during her youth. Laura gets a scholarship for a semester at Columbia University, which is the only way they could afford for her to go. Now let's be clear -- we agree with women's plight from that time period of wanting more than "home, husband, kids." But Laura's character was poorly developed so that we never rooted for her. This was a poor "wannabe" of The Awakening by Kate Chopin -- one of my fave books of all time. I already felt this book's "wannabe" status, when a copy of The Awakening shows up in this book -- What??! In other words, in case you didn't already get the comparison, this author hits you over the head with it. 

1993-----Sadie is the granddaughter of Laura Lyons, and Sadie works at the NYC Library. It's not clear why she kept it a secret that her grandmother was a famous novelist. I'd talk about it if working with other bibliophiles; most folks would, imho. 

Both time periods have thievery of rare books from a locked/guarded section of the library. In the big picture, the historical importance of this story is the real life Columbia University rare book heist of 1994 --- where the thief was caught, jailed, and found guilty. And at sentencing, after a library official explains to the Judge that this wasn't just any stolen book, it was the theft of culture -- theft of the potential for future researchers to consult that material -- then the Judge "up-sentences" the jail time, increasing the time from what the jury had decided. He increases the sentence as a warning to all would-be thieves of rare items from libraries, and that lesson still stands today as a deterrent. This is fascinating, yes? But it's barely a blip in this book's storyline. What we get instead are poorly-developed characters -- whom we think we know until suddenly something happens out of the blue that has us wondering, Where did that come from?? (See spoiler below, if you're inclined)

If we hadn't already read 2 of this author's books and liked them, we might have stopped reading this one because the first 100 pgs are slow. I don't like pushing my way thru a book. I'm also sick to death of the page quota thing. --- Dear Book Publishers, STOP forcing a page count onto your authors. Let the story unfold naturally. Even if it ends up at 250 pages versus the almost-400 pgs that seem to be de rigueur these days.

Symbolism of "Lions" in the title. It's easy to see that the lion statues in front of the library is what the title refers to. Also, the Lyons family. Then we hear, "Jack made the lion's share of the decisions." In other words, the men of that period were the lions of their families...protecting, supporting ($$), controlling. Often, that control runs counter to what family members want for themselves -- whether it's the daughters who are pushed to get married, or wives who aren't allowed to detour from their duties as homemakers and moms. Or even sons who are expected to follow in dad's footsteps (eg, take over the fam biz, etc). 

SPOILER ALERT--poor character development-- such as...(stop reading to avoid spoilers)...such as little 11 yr old Jack joining a gang, stealing books, setting his dad's manuscript on fire, then running away to live on the streets. Talk about your nonsequitors. And Jack was the perfect husband. Loving, supports his wife's dream for college (in 1914!)...then turns into a crazy guy when faced with Laura's indiscretions with Amelia (a mover & shaker among feminists of that period). Also, Laura had it really good -- and we don't get into her head to find out why she's ready to risk everything over a fling - and why did she want that fling to begin with?? Jack was, according to all descriptions, a really sweet guy. 

DNF: Orphanage by the Lake, by Daniel G. Miller

DNF = Did not finish

I began worrying when cliches cropped up. Pg 25-"where there's smoke, there's fire." Then I realized that the main character, a female private I, was doing/saying things that a woman would not do/say. Realizing that the author is a man, I thought I'd better read some Goodreads reviews. Wow, a ton of 2-stars. Below review sums up why I'm stopping at page 30. From other reviews, I see our private I drinks a ton of "sugar free Red Bull." This tells us that the company paid the author to include this product. Just like we see on tv. Life's too short to read crappy books.

"...you can tell its a woman written by a man.. some of the things she said or did seemed like a mildly stereotypical representation of what a man THINKS that a woman is thinking about or doing. and on another note, how does hazel have leisure time while literally under a deadline to find a missing girl? like ma’am this is not the time to be getting drunk, sleeping over at a man’s house, eating crappy breakfasts cooked by said man and giggling bc he’s...so sus." 

Greek Lessons, by Han Kang

 Han Kang writes beautifully; however, I stopped reading this book halfway through. It starts out introducing us to a young woman who cannot speak. She lost language when she was 16. Got it back. Then 20 yrs later, loses it again. Seems stress related. The other character is a professor of Greek Language who is losing his eyesight. The story is soooo slow, it's like there's no plot. 

Puzzle Box, by Danielle Trussoni

We really loved Trussoni's book, the Puzzle Master, so we wanted to read this one too. Mike Brink experienced a head injury as a teen and developed Sudden Savant Syndrome. He can solve the hardest puzzles. Sees patterns everywhere. 

For me, this book didn't work because of the numerous Japanese goddesses and emperors. I stopped at pg 90. But "L" listens to audio and she finished the book. She liked it, but there was way too much "filler." Listening to audio makes it easier to push thru a book with technical words (cultural gods, language) and filler. For me, I read print, and if a book doesn't keep me turning pages, sometimes I just give up. 

We expect there may be another Mike Brink novel from Trussoni (similar to Dan Brown's "Robert Langdon" books). We'll probably read it, but I'll try to get the audio.