If Shadow of the Wind missed your radar then like me, you may not be familiar with the most success modern writer in Spain, Carlos Ruiz Zafon. The Prince of Mist was my first exposure to his magical story telling. Since this is a young adult novel, I started listening to it with my skeptical grown up ear intact. But like a few of the audio CD's I have listened in the past few years, this one kept me driving, made me long for red lights, traffic and school runs.
It is not a perfect story for the grown up but for children who aren't bogged down by whether stone statues of clowns were the right image to repeatedly describe, it is wonderful. I suspended disbelief when my three young urbanites land in a seaside town in 1943 to escape the impending doom. But the devil incarnate has a history on these chosen shores and the children are excitingly and tragically caught up in it.
They have parents but when the youngest falls into a coma, they take her to the hospital and leave the teenagers to cycle, swim, dive and get to know a local who changes their lives forever.
Dan Stevens reads the story beautifully. I am on a quest now to listen to everything he reads. He most famous to us at the JBW for reading the Alex Rider novels on CD. So when I embarked on the Prince of Mist, it was like being read a story by a family member. His voice, like that of Martin Jarvis is so familiar, so versatile.
I found this unputdownable. But if you loved Shadow of the Wind, pretend it is by someone else and judge it on its own merits.
Comments