"The Prisoner of Heaven" Book Review

The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"Once again, internationally acclaimed, New York Times bestselling author Carlos Ruiz Zafón creates a rich, labyrinthine tale of love, literature, passion, and revenge, set in a dark, gothic Barcelona, in which the heroes of 'The Shadow of the Wind' and 'The Angel's Game' must contend with a nemesis that threatens to destroy them.

"Barcelona,1957. It is Christmas, and Daniel Sempere and his wife Bea have much to celebrate. They have a beautiful new baby son named Julian, and their close friend Fermín Romero de Torres is about to be wed. But their joy is eclipsed when a mysterious stranger visits the Sempere bookshop and threatens to divulge a terrible secret that has been buried for two decades in the city's dark past. His appearance plunges Fermín and Daniel into a dangerous adventure that will take them back to the 1940's and the dark early days of Franco's dictatorship. The terrifying events of that time launch them on a journey fraught with jealousy, suspicion, vengeance, and lies, a search for the truth that will put into peril everything they love and ultimately transform their lives.

"Full of intrigue and emotion, 'The Prisoner of Heaven' is a majestic novel in which the threads of 'The Shadow of the Wind' and 'The Angel's Game' converge under the spell of literature and bring us toward the enigma of the mystery hidden at the heart of the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, a collection of lost treasures known only to its few initiates and the very core of Carlos Ruiz Zafón's enchanting fictional world.

“Gabriel GarcÍa Marquez meets Umberto Eco meets Jorge Luis Borges for a sprawling magic show." —New York Times Book Review on 'The Shadow of the Wind'."

Although I haven't mentioned him before on this blog, I love, love, love Carlos Ruiz Zafon's work! I think he is absolutely brilliant and have loved him since I spotted "The Prince of Mist" and "The Shadow of the Wind".

Some of the credit for my instant attraction to his work has to be attributed to the designers of the book covers: Chin-Yee Lai for "The Angel's Game", Robin Bilardello for "The Prisoner of Heaven", and, in particular, Tal Goretsky for "The Shadow of the Wind". I absolutely loved that cover, it so well drawn and I've always been intrigued by a book inside of a book resembled on the cover of a book, and I thought this time it had been very cleverly and beautifully rendered. And the compliment from Stephen King helped as well.

I love his descriptions of a past Barcelona in its unapologetic prime, I love his witty characters and dialogue, and I love the mystique he puts in everything. I also like his characters mentioning of other books, usually the classics, while describing their fraught lives. He's one of my favorite authors of all time. So, imagine my joy when I found this new book of his at the bookstore, I knew (hoped?) he was going to write more, but I had no idea something had come out recently.

As the summary suggests, this book lays out the history of Fermín Romero de Torres, one of the beloved characters from the series. New villains appear in the form of Mauricio Valls, a greedy, sadistic character who runs a war prisoners jail in the mountains above Barcelona. His heinous crimes come too close to home for Daniel Sempere's family and even threatens to ruin Fermín's one chance at happiness. Other characters from the previous two books also show up, either as actual participants in the new part of the saga, or they are tantalizingly mentioned by the two main characters.

I enjoyed this book as well as the other two ("The Angel's Game" and "The Shadow of the Wind") and I thought this could be a good ending for the series, speaking from a literary standpoint, of course, but I hope there is more! I just love everything too much to let it go. I want to know how everything ends for these people. What happened to Daniel Martin and Julian Carax? It can't end with such a cliff-hanger! Oh, Zafon, how you tease!


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