Calcutta, 1916. A burning locomotive pierces the night carrying a load of dead innocents. Under a pouring rain that night, a young English lieutenant, sacrificing their lives to rescue newborn twins stalked by a tragic destiny. Calcutta, 1932. Ben, the twin male, age sixteen, he left the orphanage, St. Patricks and celebrates the beginning of his adult life. It is also the last day of Chowbar Society, a secret club that counts seven orphans as Ben, which met for years at midnight under a roof of stars in the main hall of an old ruined building, the Palace of Midnight. The seven boys are confident that this will be their last night together, but the past knocks on the door of Ben: the beautiful sister who could not have entered the Palace with a crazy story to tell. The embers of the fire sixteen years before they begin to burn. For three interminable days the members of the Society Chowbar try to decipher what lies behind the history of Ben and his sister, while fighting a terrible second fire started by a shadow of mystery. And when the hell now seems to have taken the upper hand and the inevitable fulfillment of destiny, the fire suddenly turns off ... and a white snow falls on the streets of Calcutta. Write a comment on the books Zafón is always difficult. I am of the view that, apart from some more or less rare exception, many authors are able to write a masterpiece only in their entire career. What Zafón is undoubtedly "The Shadow of the Wind." All the others written before or after, the all alike, but with a little bit less, which does not make them equal.
This author certainly writes well (he was a bit 'that do not start and finished a book in an afternoon) and has the unique ability to involve that tells the full story, to the point that you can not disconnect until the end. This novel, however, I found it a bit 'too hasty. " The events take place in a couple of days, and often used the expedient Zafón, already used in other novels, to tell a character all the things that might not otherwise be explained, as if he had any doubt about the plot that wants to follow. It also highlights the scene inside the subway station, is a succession of twist a bit 'too predictable culminating in a finale too dull (well, this man is a kind of human torch in the end dies a match?).
I am convinced that people like me who so loved Shadow of the Wind is still a little disappointed (or more than disappointed, puzzled) by this novel (as well as "The Angel's Game" and "Marina", but they had from the 'Barcelona setting).
That said though, I do not feel absolutely inadvisable because it is hard to find among the authors of best sellers, a category which falls Zafón some years now, with such an ability to use words.
Note the translation is the first I read Zafón translated, as I prefer when I can read English authors in the original language. But I would say that was good.
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