I wanted to read another Coelho for a wider impression. Brida was not a favourite, and The Alchemist was coming-of-age. The Zahir is the story of an older man trying to find his wife who left him mysteriously after ten years. Set in Paris, and travelling to Kazakhstan, the protagonist moves from lauded writer to the street people of Paris, to the deserts of Asia, looking for wisdom and the reason people he loves choose to leave him. Obsession. Creativity. Epilepsy. An interesting combination of the things we need to learn and the people who are sent to help us do so.
