Quicklet on Carlos Ruiz Zafón's The Shadow of the Wind

ABOUT THE BOOK

If you'll allow me an immediate personal tangent, I feel obligated to tell you my favorite book of all time is 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I read it in high school and came away shocked at how deeply I connected with a genre as fantastical as magical realism. Reading The Shadow of the Wind conjured memories of my first experience with 100 Years of Solitude. Both stories span generations and have a dizzying amount of characters, most of whom never meet, but all of whom are mysteriously connected by a powerful force.

MEET THE AUTHOR

Luke stole an English degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He has been a blogger for nearly a decade and a digital editor at an ad agency for three years. Luke enjoys playing sports, reading, listening to music, trying to play songs he likes on the guitar, quickly giving up on that and playing video games, and spending quality time with his wife.

Facebook: /ltrayser Twitter: @ltrayser

EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK

It's easy to imagine little Daniel, wide-eyed and silent, taking in the book-filled labyrinth of impossible geometry and nodding in response to his dad's question. His father lets him in on one of the Cemetery's traditions: first-time visitors choose a book. Once Daniel chooses, it will be his duty to make sure that as long as he's alive, his book is as well.He chooses The Shadow of the Wind by Julian Carax. He knows nothing about the book or its author, but that doesn't matter. The boy couldn't shake the feeling that it was waiting for him, and for more than 10 years.

In the coming pages, Daniel's life will be in danger because of The Shadow of the Wind, so it's paramount that we are fully on board with the notion that he'd put himself in harm's way to preserve words on a page.