Carol Goodman is pretty reliable, and I’ve read all of her novels, but with Arcadia Falls, I think she slips a bit. I’m frustrated because she’s so very close to writing great stories, but they don’t always transcend just average fiction. That said, I enjoyed the book and can’t say I’m sorry I spent the time reading it.

She wobbles a bit here from her usual commitment to hiding clues in material objects, an art history approach that I always find entertaining and didn’t find as much of here. The “story within a story” approach appears in all her books, but not to as much advantage here as in other works. She still has a terrific ability to generate atmosphere, and the haunting atmosphere of the woods serves the story well.

I did wish for a slightly less convoluted plot. I don’t mind mulling a book over afterward, but if I have to stop ten pages from the end to say, “So that means that….???,” then that’s probably not a good sign. Arcadia Falls also stretches my limits of credulity – we’re supposed to believe that the protagonist finds a long-missing journal from a woman she’s spent years researching for a doctoral thesis, and it takes her weeks to get to the end of it?

As said, just a few small flaws which, in my opinion, keep Arcadia Falls from being one of Goodman’s best works to date. But she’s close enough that I’ll be first in line for the next book!

After a friend sent me an advance copy of The Shadow of the Wind, I've been watching for Carlos Ruiz Zafon's next effort, and hooray for BookBrowse for making it available! Zafon's plot construction and writing are just as beautiful here as in Shadow, and The Angel's Game is one of those wonderful books that you keep picking up and putting down, because as badly as you want to read it, you also want to make it last as long as possible.

And, if you never understood the quibbling over various translations of classic text, then you need to read Zafon translated by Lucia Graves. I can't imagine a translator doing more to preserve and convey an author's work, and her deftness with his sarcasm and humor are remarkable.

Now, we just need to get Guillermo del Toro to bring one of Carlos Ruiz Zafon's works to the big screen!