A haunting gothic mystery from Carlos Ruiz Zafon, which has long been a cult classic in Spain and is now an international bestseller.

"We all have a secret buried under lock and key in the attic of our soul. This is mine."

Fifteen-year-old Oscar Drai meets the strange Marina while he's out exploring an old quarter of Barcelona. She leads Oscar to a cemetery, where they watch a macabre ritual that occurs on the last Sunday of each month. At exactly 10 o'clock in the morning, a woman shrouded in a black velvet cloak descends from her carriage to place a single rose on an unmarked grave.

When Oscar and Marina decide to follow her, they begin a journey that transports them to a forgotten postwar Barcelona—a world of aristocrats and actresses, inventors and tycoons—and reveals a dark secret that lies waiting in the mysterious labyrinth beneath the city streets.

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