Book Club Guide

The Shadow of the Wind

by Carlos Ruiz Zafon · 2001 · Literary Fiction

Key themes

Books as a form of love — and of obsession
Post-Civil War Barcelona as a city haunted by its recent past
The mystery that becomes a mirror — what we find when we look for the story of a life

About this book

In post-Civil War Barcelona, a boy named Daniel is taken by his father to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, where he chooses a novel by Julian Carax — and begins to discover that someone has been systematically destroying every copy of Carax's work. Zafon's novel is a love letter to books, to Barcelona and to the Gothic tradition.

Published in Spanish in 2001, The Shadow of the Wind has sold over fifteen million copies worldwide. It is the first of the Cemetery of Forgotten Books quartet. Zafon said he wrote the book he had always wanted to read.

Discussion questions

The Cemetery of Forgotten Books is one of fiction's great invented locations. What does this conceit — a repository for books that would otherwise disappear — say about the relationship between books and time?
The mystery of Julian Carax's life gradually reveals something about Barcelona's Francoist past. How does Zafon weave the historical and the personal — and does one feel more real than the other?
Several characters in the novel become obsessed with the same subject. What is Zafon saying through this pattern of obsession — about what stories do to those who pursue them?
The novel is full of literary allusions and self-conscious love of reading. Does this meta-literary quality enrich or become self-indulgent?
The Shadow of the Wind is an international bestseller that was initially rejected by publishers. What does its eventual success say about what readers want — and about what the publishing industry misses?