It was pride that precipitated Lucifer’s fall from heaven and it is that deadly sin that continues to tempt mere mortals into very bad things. The idea that we can somehow overcome humble beginnings and surpass our maker is a seductive fantasy indeed, but often such arrogance proves to be our undoing.

David Martin, for instance, just wants to be a great writer.

His beginnings as an assistant at the local newspaper are innocent enough and after proving his ability to weave a lurid tale on a tight deadline, David finds himself authoring a recurring series of stories set in his home of Barcelona. With the help of a wealthy mentor, the stories find success and it isn’t long before young David is hired by a morally questionable publishing team to crank out a collection of “penny dreadfuls” dubbed City of the Damned.

Bleary-eyed but exhilarated, David spends nearly a decade running himself ragged to meet the gruelling contract, requiring a daily 6.66 pages “packed with intrigue, high-society murder, countless underworld horrors, illicit love affairs” and other sordid fare. It almost doesn’t matter that roughly a decade of painstaking typing is contractually obligated to be published under the pseudonym Ignatius B. Samson, or that the books are of virtually no substance because, David reasons, “It seemed a small price to pay for being able to make a living from the profession I had always dreamed of practising.” He therefore decides to “ put aside any vanity about seeing my name on my work, while remaining true to myself, to what I was.”

As if one absurdly long and binding contract wasn’t enough, David signs a staggering 10-year rental agreement on an exceptionally sinister — and dusty — abandoned mansion. Now brimming with overconfidence and finally flush with cash, David begins zealously racking up the full collection of mortal sins. Most notably, he arrogantly rewrites his mentor’s life work, based on an absurd notion that the man, in his despair, simply won’t notice. When David is conveniently diagnosed with a terminal brain tumour and the first grand novel bearing his name is a colossal flop, the stage is set for David to make the ultimate deal with a nefarious French publisher, Andreas Corelli. In exchange for one year of work spent crafting a new religion, David will be delivered from his death and made a wealthy man.

This sixth novel from Spanish author Carlos Ruiz Zafon is an intricate and amusing tale that contains all the necessary elements of a thrilling encounter with the devil — lawyers, contracts, debts, six-pointed stars, fiery deaths and suicides. Despite the overwhelming lack of subtlety and more than a few moments of sheer ludicrousness, the story is initially entertaining and engaging. While Zafon seems to get off-track in a tedious middle section, the last third regains some lost ground, although by now the novel is mired in convoluted plot twists punctuated by some intimidating policemen, a few violent chases and a great deal of dead bodies. As David comes to understand the true nature of his pact with Corelli and the deadly web of lies behind it, he is driven by a relentless desire to uncover the truth and, in the process, is forced to confront his own shadows in order to return to his principles.

If only David had known all the difficulties that lay along the path to greatness. But as he remarks early on, one should “never underestimate a writer’s vanity, especially that of a mediocre writer.”