The Angel's Game: A Psychological Thriller Paperback – May 18, 2010

This author really captures the imagination and with his descriptive writing he creates a world that you can live in while reading the book. So enjoyable, I couldn’t put it down. Unpredictable and believable. I could not put this book down. I can hardly wait to read the others in the Series.

I read The Shadow of the Wind about a year ago and enjoyed it, so I was quite glad to find The Angel's Game when I was looking for books to download for my trip to Spain. While the bright, modern Barcelona I visited was in many ways different than Ruiz's Barcelona, there are references to many of the major areas like Las Ramblas. His descriptions are vivid, and he employs the history of the city in a way I found accurate and interesting. For instance, using Gaudi's park as a mysterious and isolated meeting place makes so much sense given that when it was built, it was seen as being too removed from the city so people didn't move there.Personally, I found this book very similar to The Shadow of the Wind, though many of the reviews say differently. Perhaps I'm focused too broadly, but I saw a lot of commonalities. Both are set in Barcelona. Both have a young man with only a father to raise him and an infatuation with a woman beyond his reach. Both have mysterious written texts that are essential elements to the plot. Both have houses that reach out of the past to influence events of the present. Even a couple of details from the previous book are used in this one. Obviously, not everything is the same, but if someone is looking for something like The Shadow of the Wind, I think it can be found in The Angel's Game.I didn't care much for the ending in this book. It felt like this elaborate story had been crafted, and then the end was a bit rushed. I definitely came out of it feeling a bit disoriented and like some elements hadn't been fully resolved. In some ways I think that is probably in part because of the nature of the conflict, but it also felt a bit like maybe I was missing something. I had assumed that it was my issue, but reading the other reviews, I think it is a flaw with the writing. Overall, though, I really enjoyed the journey to the ending, and while I didn't get the pay off I wanted, the rest was definitely worthwhile.

When I read that Carols Ruiz Zafon had another novel in the works, I knew it was going to be compared to The Shadow of the Wind. It was after all a bestseller and compared to literary masterpieces. The Angel's Game does have a few things in common with The Shadow of the Wind, but don't expect a replica of Zafon's previous novel.The Angel's Game features two familiar characters from the Shadow of the Wind, Daniel Sempere and his father. The Cemetary of Forgotten Books also makes an appearance in this book. As in TSOTW, The Angel's Game takes place in Barcelona and revolves around the story behind an old ruin. In The Shadow of the Wind, it was the Aldaya mansion. In The Angel's game, it's an old tower house.The TSOTW was about a mysterious author. The new novel is about a mysterious editor. This pretty much sums up what the two books have in common.In this novel, writer David Martin is paid a small fortune to write a mysterious novel for man named Andreas Corelli. David also moves into an old tower house that few people have the courage to step into and find himself up to his neck in the mystery surrounding the strange death of his home's former occupant. David's sleuthing ends up endangering not only his life, but those nearest and dearest to his heart.The Angel's Game is much darker than the previous book. It has a dose of the supernatural that may not appeal to everyone. The author clearly stated that The Angel's Game would be Shadow's "wicked gothic stepsister". The novel starts off fairly ordinary. A young man who survived a horrible childhood struggles to pursue his dream as a writer. David seems to have reached a dead end until he is made the offer of a lifetime, but the reader quickly begins to feel that David has made a deal with the devil.The Angel's Game is a strange book, but like The Shadow of the Wind, it is positively addictive. Carlos Ruiz Zafon has a way of bringing the streets of Barcelona alive and make the reader feel they are walking in the character's footsteps. Few authors managed to pull this off, but this author is a master at it.I loved The Angel's Game and The Shadow of the Wind. They share some things in common, but the themes are very different. I was a fan of Carlos Ruiz Zafon after reading The Shadow of the Wind, and I'm even bigger fan now. I look forward to many more books by this author.

Love all Carlos Ruis ZafonBooks, fantastic, gothic

A série toda é muito boa. Os 4 livros. Carlos Ruiz Zafon foi um grande escritor. Este, cronologicamente é o primeiro.

Ruiz Zafón siempre me sorprende. Además tiene una escritura fluida, llena de diálogos y los finales de sus libros los borda

I love this author. So sad he already passed away.I was highly entertained and enchanted by this novel, just like I was by his other novels.If you enjoy mystery, beautiful language and suspense, you may enjoy this.

Het zijn mijn lievelingsboeken, zowel in het Nederlands als in het Engels. Dikke, dikke aanrader!!!!

After having read 'The shadow of the Wind' this is my secondbook of Zafon, and it is nearly as good as my first.