Zahir [Paperback]

Paulo Coelho (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 24, 2006

One day a renowned author discivers that his wife, a war correspondent has disappeared without a trace. Though time brings more success and new love, he reamins mystified and fascinated by her absence.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The press chat cites 65 million copies of Coelho's eight previous novels in print, making the Brazilian author one of the world's bestselling novelists (150 countries and 56 languages). This book, whose title means "the present" or "unable to go unnoticed" in Arabic, has an initial staggered laydown of eight million copies in 83 countries and 42 languages. It centers on the narrator's search for his missing wife, Esther, a journalist who fled Iraq in the runup to the present war, only to disappear from Paris; the narrator, a writer, is freed from suspicion when his lover, Marie, comes forward with a (true) alibi. He seeks out Mikhail, the man who may be Esther's most recent lover and with whom she was last seen, who has abandoned his native Kazakhstan for a kind of speaking tour on love. Mikhail introduces the narrator to a global underground "tribe" of spiritual seekers who resist, somewhat vaguely, conventional ways of living. Through the narrator's journey from Paris to Kazakhstan, Coelho explores various meanings of love and life, but the impact of these lessons is diminished significantly as they are repeated in various forms by various characters. Then again, 65 million readers can't be wrong; the spare, propulsive style that drove The Alchemist, Eleven Minutes and Coelho's other books will easily carry fans through myriad iterations of the ways and means of amor. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Subtitled A Novel of Obsession, this tale is the philosophical and spiritual chronicle of one man's quest for self-discovery. Stunned by his wife's inexplicable disappearance from their Paris home and immediately suspected of foul play by the authorities and the press, the unnamed protagonist, a best-selling writer, is forced to reexamine both his marital relationship and his own life. What he eventually discovers with the help of a -mysterious stranger named Mikhail--a man he suspects is somehow involved in Esther's disappearance--is that he must first "find himself" before he can ever hope to find his wife. Although Esther is physically and emotionally lost to him, he rediscovers her as he retraces both her footsteps and the disintegration of their visceral connection. Finally able to release the past and his anger, he can accept the uncertainty of the present by traveling to Kazakhstan with Mikhail in search of Esther and the remote possibility of resurrecting a dormant love. As in The Alchemist (1993), Coelho continues to prove himself a contemporary fabulist, spinning irresistible stories while seeking enlightenment at the same time. Interwoven with details drawn from his life, the mesmerizing narrative offers a highly personal meditation on the meaning and the power of love. Margaret Flanagan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: HarperCollins,Australia (July 24, 2006)
• Language: French
• ISBN-10: 073228449X
• ISBN-13: 978-0732284497
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (97 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,270,308 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

The Brazilian author PAULO COELHO was born in 1947 in the city of Rio de Janeiro. Before dedicating his life completely to literature, he worked as theatre director and actor, lyricist and journalist.

In 1986, PAULO COELHO did the pilgrimage to Saint James of Compostella, an experience later to be documented in his book The Pilgrimage.

In the following year, COELHO published The Alchemist. Slow initial sales convinced his first publisher to drop the novel, but it went on to become one of the best selling Brazilian books of all time.

Other titles include Brida (1990), The Valkyries (1992), By the river Piedra I sat Down and Wept (1994), the collection of his best columns published in the Brazilian newspaper Folha de S'o Paulo entitle Maktub (1994), the compilation of texts Phrases (1995), The Fifth Mountain (1996), Manual of a Warrior of Light (1997), Veronika decides to die (1998), The Devil and Miss Prym (2000), the compilation of traditional tales in Stories for parents, children and grandchildren (2001), Eleven Minutes (2003), The Zahir (2005)

During the months of March, April, May and June 2006, Paulo Coelho traveled to celebrate the 20th anniversary of his pilgrimage to Saint James of Compostella in 1986. He also held surprise book signings - announced one day in advance - in some cities along the way, to have a chance to meet his readers. In ninety days of pilgrimage the author traveled around the globe and took the famous Transiberrian train that took him to Vladivostok. During this experience Paulo Coelho launched his blog Walking the Path - The Pilgrimage in order to share with his readers his impressions.

Since this first blog Paulo Coelho has expanded his presence in the internet with his daily blogs in Wordpress (http://paulocoelhoblog.com), Myspace (http://www.myspace.com/paulocoelho) & Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Paulo-Coelho/11777366210). He is equally present in media sharing sites such as Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=paulabraconnot) and Flickr (http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulo_coelho/sets) , offering on a regular basis not only texts but also videos and pictures to his readers.

From this intensive interest and use of the Internet sprang his bold new project: The Experimental Witch http://paulocoelhoblog.com/experimental-witch where he invites his readers to adapt to the screen his book The Witch of Portobello. You can still subscribe in this experiment!

Indeed Paulo Coelho is a firm believer of Internet as a new media and is the first Best-selling author to actively support online free distribution http://piratecoelho.wordpress.com of his work.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

89 of 98 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars This is not Paulo Coelho's best effort, November 8, 2005

By 

John Hudson "used2books" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Zahir: A Novel of Obsession (Hardcover)

I am a big fan of Paulo Coelho's work. I believe time will show him to be an important writer.

I first discovered him with "Veronica Decides to Die" on an airplane flight. It made me want to rush out and do something wonderful with my life, and I've recommended it to friends. Several of his titles are permanent parts of my library.

That said, however, I was frankly disappointed by "The Zahir." I don't believe there's the moment of transformation for any main character which we've come to expect from Paulo Coelho. I don't believe there's an adequate exploration of the conflict that gets his tale going in the first place. Things just seem to meander from one place to another until the story fills enough pages to call it a day. I sincerely believe a first time author would have found it difficult to get this published.

Buy the rest of Paulo Coelho's books. Loan them to friends. Keep them in your library so you can read them again and again. But if you really want to read this one, check it out from the public library so that you can return it when you're done.

56 of 61 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Finding yourself in searching for another, December 19, 2005

By 

Steven R. McEvoy "MCWPP" (Canada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Zahir: A Novel of Obsession (Hardcover)

I've returned once again to one of my favorite authors to review his latest work. Paulo Coelho of international fame for The Alchemist, 11 Minutes and The Devil and Miss Prym, has released his latest The Zahir. According to the book, the Zahir in Arabic means present, visible, incapable of being unnoticed. It is something that grabs our thought, mind and spirit and demands our full attention. It is believed to lead to either Holiness or madness. In this book, the Zahir is a woman, an idea of a woman, a longing. Our main character sounds very familiar to our author; in fact our hero is a famous author now living in Paris, with his books being published in nearly every language. (which sounds like Mr. Coelho. This book is being published in 50 countries/languages this year alone. [...]) The author writes books that millions love, adore, and claim changes their lives. Yet he appears to have stopped living the type of deliberate life he writes about. He has settled into a complacent life.
Then one day his wife disappears. Over time she becomes his Zahir; he writes a book about love and for a while the Zahir fades. Then he meets the man he believes she had left with and the Zahir returns.
This is a wonderful story about becoming, and remembering who you were meant to be, not who you settled into. It will stir in you a passion to be more than you think you can be, and, to give more, and love more purely. Follow a man who goes in search of an estranged wife, only to find himself.

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Coelho's beautiful tale captures the reader's empathy and interest both, May 28, 2007

By 

Omar Siddique (Ellicott City, MD USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Zahir: A Novel of Obsession (P.S.) (Paperback)

Master storyteller Paulo Coelho's stories are all semi-autobiographical in nature, read well, are set in fascinating locations, and leave you thinking the author has somehow seen more deeply into the human spirit than most of us. It's hard to read his books without feeling deeply touched, and The Zahir is no exception.

There are themes of love, belonging, separation, anxiety, heartbreak, understanding, alienation, need, want. Many settings, in many places including Paris, Madrid, Kazakstan. The themes are ones that absorb all humankind whether we realize them or not.

I read this book at a bad time in my life, pulling it randomly from my wife's bookshelf, and being pulled into the book as if it were somehow the correct choice of all the books I could have picked. It spoke to me deeply of love and understanding, in a way that I think many couples, many who have loved or lost will instantly empathize with. Following in the narrator's steps, we arrive where he does, gain wisdom as he does, and achieve enlightenment as he does. And hopefully, find and regain true love that had been neglected, as he does.

Coelho's native language is not English, yet none of his writing feels "translated" or stilted like happens to many foreign writings when they appear in English.

It is as if the author has a special gift for storytelling that transcends individual languages, the the vast number of countries in which his books have been published seems to support that.

Whether you are looking to be entertained by a lively tale, or are seeking solace and understanding as I was, The Zahir will fill your need. If you are in need of both then it behooves you to read everything this master storyteller has written.