The Zahir tells an incredible journey of a man whose wife has left the house without letting him know.His search for her and the meaning of their marriage and above all, Paulo Coelho's writing is spectacular to watch.

I believe the quotation below will be sufficient to show how brilliant Coelho is: ‘Marie, let’s suppose that two firemen go into a forest to put out a small fire. Afterwards, when they emerge and go over to a stream, the face of one is all smeared with black, while the other man’s face is completely clean. My question is this: which of the two will wash his face? ‘That’s a silly question. The one with the dirty face of course.’ ‘No, the one with the dirty face will look at the other man and assu...

I liked The Alchemist... And I liked a few other Coelho novels- especially if I happened to be reading them at just the right time in my life. I stopped reading The Zahir at pg. 200 because I couldn't take any more of the mystical, inner voice, follow-the-signs, journey-seeking cheeseball shit that seems to be this author's bread and butter. I admit, I've enjoyed Coelho at certain times and when in the right mood. But this time it came across to me as an author's regurgitation of the same theme,...

I was diasspointed with this and I would consider myself a fan of Paolo Coelho. I just don't think this lived up to his usual work. The plot was weak and there was a lot of annoying, sentimental stream-of-consciousness drivel about the meaning of love and the meaning of life. It's true that these are Coelho's usual themes but I think he's gotten a bit carried away with all the sentiment in this novel and forgotten the story in the process. The only thing that kept me reading until the end was my...

I don't like it when the author starts to talk about spirituality; it's clear that it is the favourite theme of "Coelho" that I respect but that I appreciate it MORE when he talks about life in general!I liked some parts of the Zahir and hated others!

The Zahir is "someone or something which, once we have come into contact with them or it, gradually occupies our every thought, until we can think of nothing else. This can be considered either a state of holiness or of madness." This, and the spellbinding dedication page to Coelho's wife, Christina, made me want to read this novel. Plus, the story initially lured me. A writer's war correspondent wife goes missing. At first he's treated like a suspect until it's determined that she wasn't abduct...

So far my least favorite of Coelho's books. A woman leaves her husband with no explanation to find out how to be happy. She leaves no note, no messenger, takes nothing, just seems to disappear. He finds himself in the journey and learns he needs to look for her because he loves her, not because he is obsessed. Along the way other hearts get broken.Quotes:"When someone leaves, it's because someone else is about to arrive - I'll find love again.""In order to be able to find her, I first had to fin...

Me after completing a Paulo Coelho book

O Zahir = The Zahir, Paulo CoelhoThe Zahir is a 2005 novel by the Brazilian writer Paulo Coelho. Just as in an earlier book, The Alchemist, The Zahir is about a pilgrimage. The book touches on themes of love, loss and obsession. The Zahir was written in Coelho's native language, Portuguese, and it has been translated into 44 languages. The Zahir means 'the obvious' or 'conspicuous' in Arabic. The story revolves around the life of the narrator, a novelist, and in particular his search for his mis...

1 star. Self-congratulatory, conceited wankery. Only earns it's 1 as the prose was easy to read and well written for what it was. If you would like to read a book about how fantastic Coelho thinks he is, this is for you.-------------By demand, my blog post on this book:-------------I am just going to come out and say it.Paulo Coelho is a knob.I dislike this man, his opinions and his writing. I have read The Alchemist and the The Fifth Mountain in the past and have felt that they were completely

2.6 stars Okay, dear dear Paulo Coelho. Where do I start? This is how this book briefly was written. Careful, this review contains spoilers!(view spoiler)[ Just so you guys and girls know, this is the seventh book I read by the dude in here, so I am talking based on previous experience, not prejudgment, ok? Paulo in this extravagant novel is searching for his wife who decided to leave no trace of her whereabouts to him because she felt unhappy. Unhappy because he doesn't understand her, beca

The (Zahir) is a concept that was totally new to me , I had to do some further research to find out that it is related to the Sufi , I read the book in English but after noticing the Arabic edition , I would have preferred if it was titled (Al zaher الظاهر ) as a translation not as a repetition !I liked the definition he reached at the ednd : (The zahir was the fixation on everything that had been passed from generation to generation ; it left no question unanswered , it looks up all the space ;...

Typical Coelho...lots of really good quotes. whether you agree with them or not does not really matter but he makes you think by hitting the extremes. When i get time i will type my favorite two pages which I think summarize the whole book. here are some others."Although I know that I may have lost forever the woman I love, I must try to enjoy all the graces that God has given me today. Grace cannot be hoarded. There are no banks where it can be deposited to be used when I feel more at peace wit...

It took me a year to finish this book. There are two reasons- 1. I am too busy and 2. This book is indeed too lengthy, started with a simple incident (A famous writer living in Paris whose wife is a war correspondent. After being married for ten years, one day she left, without any trace.) and the writer clung to that incident and elongated (unnecessarily) the book. I started to read this book in spite of reading all sorts of negative reviews and ratings on Goodreads. I did not have high expecta...

This book was nothing like I expected. The back description was misleading - as a novice traveller I saw that the narrator of the book was going to go through "Spain, France, Croatia" etc in order to find the love of his life. Do not be fooled, there is little to no description of these places. In fact, there is no description of Spain at all. Thoroughly disappointing. Besides that the book itself was... interesting. I admit it is a much different story than I have ever read and I was given some...

I have to say, at times I found myself obsessed with this book about obsession. At times, it didn't quite flow or seemed to bring in random points, but I felt like I just "got it" and completely understood where he was coming from. Coelho's words resonated deeply within me, and in fact, helped me to "see" and unlock some feelings that I haven't been able to understand for quite some time. In that sense, it was like an Eat, Pray, Love for me. Not to compare authors, literary styles, or anything l...

wow. do you know how and when i discovered this author? at the airport bookstore- at la guardia, the american terminal-the one next to the dunkin donuts/baskin robbins that one must ignore... you know how difficult it is to find something worthwhile to read in the airport bookstore, and i was about to buy something else- this book was in the low corner pocket and i saw it. the cover, and the title, are enticing, but could have been just over the top. but i usually test drive books buy opening th...

A great book for anyone struggling with attachment or ownership of something that you love."I heard other people speaking in the name of freedom and the more they defended this unique right, the more enslaved the seemed to be to the parent's wishes, to a marriage in which they had promised to stay with the other person "for the rest of their lives," to the bathroom scales, to their diet, to the half-finished projects, to lovers to whom they were incapable of saying "No", or "It's over", to weeke...

The very little things that made me detest this book: I believe that each reader creates his own film inside his head, gives faces to the characters, constructs every scene, hears the voices, smells the smells. And that is why, whenever a reader goes to see a film based on a novel that he likes, he leaves feeling disappointed, saying: “The book is so much better than the film.” The thing is, Paulo never describes ANYONE or ANYTHING clearly.In this book although the main character is obs

I am not a fan of this author. At all. I'm sorry but I find his books to be extremely boring. I am not a fan of books that focus on the protagonist trying to find their inner happiness or spirituality or some shit. It's all like it's not about the ending but the journey there blah blah. The moral of the story is blah blah. Total snoozefest. I would not have even read this book if I didn't have to read it for a challenge. Plus I have no idea what the protagonist's name is. Was it ever mentioned?