The Labyrinth Of The Spirits

Carlos Ruiz Zafón Weidenfeld & Nicolson €11.24 In the final volume of Zafón’s magnificent Cemetery of Forgotten Books series, we return to the Barcelona of Sempere & Sons second-hand bookshop and the malevolent Franco regime. In a dizzying tale of drama, intrigue and passion, Zafón neatly wraps up threads from previous volumes, including the mystery surrounding Daniel’s mother’s death and the identity of the novelist Julian Carax. His dénouement proceeds at perhaps too pedestrian a pace, but Zafón is a master storyteller, combining the postmodern and the traditional in an enchanting hymn to literature.