The author of 13 1⁄2 Lives of Captain Bluebear transports us to a magical world. Optimus Yarnspinner finds himself marooned in the subterranean world of Bookholm, the City of Dreaming Books, where reading can be dangerous, where ruthless Bookhunters fight to the death. Optimus Yarnspinner, a young writer, inherits from his beloved godfather an unpublished short story by an unknown author. His search for the author's identity takes him to Bookholm—the so-called City of Dreaming Books. On entering its streets, our hero feels as if he has opened the door of a gigantic second-hand bookshop. His nostrils are assailed by clouds of book dust, the stimulating scent of ancient leather, and the tang of printer's ink. Soon, though, Yarnspinner falls into the clutches of the city's evil genius, Pfistomel Smyke, who treacherously maroons him in the labyrinthine catacombs underneath the city, where reading books can be genuinely dangerous...

Over two hundred years ago Bookholm, the City of Dreaming Books, was destroyed by a catastrophic firestorm. Optimus Yarnspinner, who witnessed this disaster, has since become Zamonia's greatest writer and is resting on his laurels at Lindworm Castle. Spoilt by his monumental success and basking in adulation, he one day receives a disturbing message that finally reinvests his life with meaning: a cryptic missive that lures him back to Bookholm. Rebuilt on a magnificent scale, the city is once more a vibrant literary metropolis and Mecca of the book trade teeming with book fanatics of all kinds. On the track of the mysterious letter that brought him there, Yarnspinner has scarcely set foot in the city before he falls prey to its spirit of adventure. He is reunited with old friends like Inazia Anazazi the Uggly and Ahmed ben Kibitzer the Nocturnomath, but he also encounters the city's new marvels, which include the mysterious Biblionauts, the warring Puppetists, and the city's latest craze, the Invisible Theatre. Yarnspinner strays ever deeper into the Labyrinth of Dreaming Books, which seems to wield a strange power over Bookholm's destinies. He is eventually drawn into an irresistible maelstrom of events far more sensational than any of the adventures he has previously embarked upon.

Der Schattenkönig kehrt zurück - Walter Moers' furioses Finale der „Buchhaim-Trilogie“. „Hier fängt die Geschichte an“, so endete der Nummer-1-Bestseller „Das Labyrinth der Träumenden Bücher“ von Walter Moers. Es war der heimtückischste und umstrittenste Cliffhanger, den je ein Autor gewagt hat. Seitdem bangen wir um Hildegunst von Mythenmetz, der nach einem Orm-Rausch in den finsteren und gefährlichen Katakomben Buchhaims von seinen Begleitern im Stich gelassen worden ist. Und wir ahnen, dass es für ihn ein nervenaufreibendes und actionreiches Abenteuer werden wird, diesem ominösen Ort an Leib und Seele unbeschadet zu entkommen.