The Zahir

I have not been reading much lately. Since yesterday was a holiday, I forced myself to read something. I chose something thin from my library - and wala! The Zahir was calling to me. Some people just loved The Alchemist and everything else after that by Paulo Coelho was simply - formulaic. To a certain extent, I do agree. You can't read Coelho's works at one time - you have got to space them out.

Set in Paris and in the enchanting landscape of central Asia, this novel follows the journey of a man obsessed with finding the wife who left him without an explanation.

The narrator of The Zahir is a bestselling novelist who lives in Paris and enjoys all the privileges that money and celebrity brings. His wife of ten years, Esther, is a war correspondent who, despite her professional success and freedom from the conventional constraints of marriage, is facing an existential crisis. When she disappears along with a friend, Mikhail, who may or may not be her lover, the authorities question the narrator. Was Esther kidnapped, killed, or did she simply abandon a marriage that left her unfulfilled? The narrator doesn't have any answers but he has plenty of questions of his own.

Then one day Mikhail, the man with whom Esther was last seen, finds the narrator and promises to take him to his wife. In his attempt to recapture a love lost, the narrator discovers something unexpected about himself.

A haunting and redemptive story about the dark side of obsession, The Zahir explores its potential to both fulfill our dreams and to destroy them.

I wish to share some extracts from this book:

“We are all growing and changing shape, we notice certain weaknesses that need to be corrected, we don’t always choose the best solution, we carry on regardless, trying to remain upright and decent, in order to do honor, not to the walls or the doors or the windows, but to the empty space inside, the space were we worship and venerate what is dearest and most important to us.“

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"Esther asks why people are sad. "That's simple," said the old man. "They are prisoners of their personal history. Everyone believes that the main aim in life is to follow a plan. They never ask if that plan is theirs or if it was created by another person. They accumulate experiences, memories, things, other people's ideas, and it is more than they can possibly cope with. And that is why they forget their dreams." "That is why it is so important to let certain things go. To release them. To cut loose. People need to understand that no one is playing with marked cards; sometimes we win and sometimes we lose. Don't expect to get anything back, dont expect recognition for your efforts, don't expect your genius to be discovered or your love to be understood. Complete the circle. Not out of pride, inability or arrogance, but simply because whatever it is, no longer fits in your life. Close the door, change the record, clean the house, get rid of the dust. Stop being who you were and become who you are."

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"In all your searching, all you find is yourself."