Tuesday, 6 March 2012

Marina

Marina is a fantasy and sci-fi novel developed in the second half of the twentieth century in the city of Barcelona. This book was written in 1999 by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, the author of The Shadow of the Wind  and The Prince of the Mist, amongst other good books. This story  leads up to Shadow of the Wind.

The book tells the story of Oscar Drai, who returns to his hometown, Barcelona. He tells a story that happened fifteen years ago, in September of 1980, when he discovers that he cannot escape from his past. Oscar is fifteen years old and he lives in a boarding school. There, he explores the surroundings, and decides to enter an abandoned  old house which belonges to Sarriá. There he meets Marina and her father, Germán Blau, a painter and a widower who is very sad about his wife's death. Oscar falls in love with Marina, but their love story has mystery and terror. Oscar, with this family, try to discover the mystery that hides the Velo-Granell, an old orthopedic factory from the 1940s in Barcelona.


The prestigious weekly Der spigel said that Marina was one of the most read books in Germany in 2011.


I found this story intriguing because I never knew how the characters were going to react in  extremely tense situations, in lives they are playing. Moreover, the story seemed to be pretty incredible especially the resurrection of Kolvenik, although the first half of the novel could be true.


I think this book is very good, I like it a lot.. In a scale of 1 to 10, I would rate it a 7.