I picked up this book last summer, because my best friend has purchased a copy while shopping for books to take with her on summer vacation. It looked good to her; it looked good to me, so I bought my own copy. I have just now finally found-- or made, time to read it. I'm excited by this book, or at least the experience of reading it (enough to write a blog post about it!). It has been quite a while since I've encountered a book worthy of staying up into the wee hours of the morning for because I had to finish "just one more chapter, just one more chapter." (The last one being "The Hunger Games," by Suzanne Collins, which was almost an entire year ago, unfortunately, and also a member of the Young Adult literary genre).
When I was younger, I used to love reading. I read quickly, and I read a lot. But then, I stopped reading as much. Slowly, I began to lose my need and sadly enough, perhaps, my desire to devote my seemingly valuable hours to flipping through the paper pages of a book. I lost my time to the internet, to television, and to the g-mail, which has been both a faithful lifeboat and a ruthless captor of mine over the last few years in college. I lost my solitary time to hours of meet-ups, coffee house chats, school meetings, and petty part-time jobs. Too many days, I've settled into my bed late, late, late at night, crawled tiredly beneath my covers, and let my head sink into my pillow as I reflected on how sad my day was. I had found myself to be very bored, seemingly in a state of constant lethargy. Nothing excited me. I didn't even feel fully awake anymore. I just went about my business, day after day, moving to a robotic rhythm. Too many days, I went to bed feeling sick to my stomach with guilt of how I had chosen to spend the 24 hours before-- sitting in front of the TV, scrolling down the facebook home page with a lazy, unfocused finger and mind, and clicking the refresh button on my gmail, just in case.
This novel, "The Shadow of the Wind," was a wonderful read. But rather than summarizing the actual story, which was brilliant and beautiful (you'll have to read it yourself to find out-- and I sincerely hope that you do!), I felt like I wanted to write about what the book made me think about, what it made me feel.
I found this novel to be an absolute masterpiece, but more than that, I found it to be an ode to reading, to writing, to good tales and even better listeners; a celebration of literature and the adventures that they were once believed to contain. Above all, I was reminded today, as I closed the back cover of the novel, of how powerful a story can be. It reminded me of my own personal experience with reading-- of getting swept up into a story, clean off of my feet. It reminded me of how endless the possibilities of reading and writing must be because Zafón had managed to create for me, using nothing more than black ink and thin white paper, a world I could envision and hear, and a group of people who I felt I knew, felt I disliked, and felt I cared about.
For those who do not enjoy reading for pleasure, I'm sure that this blog post is eye-roll-worthy, and I will not try to convince you to convert to a life of book worm-ism here! But for you, fellow readers and writers, I raise my glass to you! Because we have discovered what so many others (and an increasingly number at that) have disbelieved-- that to write something meaningful, and to read something that causes you to feel something-- anything-- is nothing short of magical.
Don't worry, blogosphere, I am not unaware of how I sound right now. I am being all sorts of poor C-words right now, including but not limited to ones beginning with 'cheese-,' 'clich-,' & 'corn-"-- but honestly, it's all honest! I am thankful for the reminder. I had not just imagined the fantastic world I had discovered in books as a child-- I only forgot for a while.
So, to my fellow reading and writing friends, cheers!
And also, just to clarify, the rumours are absolutely true. I am, in fact, an English major!
- bcl.
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