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queenofstrays's review
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
kiosir's review
adventurous
emotional
funny
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
toriamos's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
Kind of boring and Quentin sooooo insufferable
metalbee's review
4.0
Un inicio muy tedioso, pero un buen final. Te mantiene entretenido hasta llegar al clima más no te engancha
crystalstarrlight's review against another edition
2.0
Bullet Review:
Rating in flux. I absolutely HATED Quentin, particularly in regards to that DEPLORABLE subplot with Alice. I have NEVER hated a character as much as I've hated Quentin.
And Quentin is why this is currently sitting at 2 stars; otherwise, it was cool and fascinating and funny, and I would likely rate at least 4 stars.
Full Review:
I suppose I should just break down and write a full review of this.
*SIGH*
I don't really want to, because I'm afraid it'll degenerate into endless lines of "I HATE QUENTIN" (making me feel, for just a moment, like Jack Nicholson's character in "The Shining") or I'll get a bunch of fans on my review going, "OMG, how could you not love this you read too much into it you hating hater!"
Quentin is adisgusting Marty Stu magic student who studies magic at Breakbills and whines about everything. He encounters magical things and tries to weasel out of the fact he cheated on his girlfriend, all the while slut-shaming her.
I can't even write a plot summary without my disgust of our main character squeezing through. I hate Quentin. I hate Quentin more than I've EVER hated ANY fictional character. I hate Quentin more than Bella Swan, Edward Cullen, Jondalar, Jacob from Miss Peregrine's (AND I HATE JACOB) and quite possibly even Anita Blake. (YES ANITA BLAKE!) I often say I can like a book with a unlikable character, and that is true. Hence why this book isn't 1-star (which I considered because I hated Quentin THAT MUCH). But Quentin's endless pessimism, negativity, sexism, misogyny, and general misanthropy nearly made me rage-quit this book.
And his treatment of Alice! Alice may have been a wimp, but let's put this out there: Quentin cheated on his girlfriend. He may have been drunk, but he knew damned well what he was doing. He'd been thinking about it ALL NIGHT. So when he gets his panties in a knot at Alice's treatment and her relationship with Penny - I got no sympathy for you Quentin! You are angry at the wrong person - you cheated ON HER. I don't care if you are sorry, you effed up bad. You made your bed; LIE IN IT.
(And it was after that scene and how the journey to Fillory got wrecked because of Quentin's whinging about Alice "cheating on him" that nearly made me ragequit the book.)
BUT. BUT.
If you could extricate Quentin from this book, it's actually really good. Sure, none of the characters are that great (though Alice and Penny are my favorites), but the story and world are interesting. I love the subtle jabs and satire at how ridiculous Narnia could be (I like Narnia, but I've always found the Christian allegory too heavy-handed). I love how fantasy novels and stories in general are chided for ridiculous rules - why do I have to go to X place and retrieve Y for Z to happen?
Of course, even ignoring the Most Despicable Fictional Character, I thought the book bit off more than it could chew. I got the impression it would focus on Magical University Life. Well, yes, it does, but only a rather small portion of the book. There are multiple other plots and subplots that come up, diluting the focus (IMO).
I already bought the sequel on ebook, so I guess I'll have to read it one of these days. Hopefully, Quentin isn't as much of a loser. I really wanted to love and adore this book to bits, but if I had to say one thing that dropped this from 4 stars to 2, it was Quentin.
Rating in flux. I absolutely HATED Quentin, particularly in regards to that DEPLORABLE subplot with Alice. I have NEVER hated a character as much as I've hated Quentin.
And Quentin is why this is currently sitting at 2 stars; otherwise, it was cool and fascinating and funny, and I would likely rate at least 4 stars.
Full Review:
I suppose I should just break down and write a full review of this.
*SIGH*
I don't really want to, because I'm afraid it'll degenerate into endless lines of "I HATE QUENTIN" (making me feel, for just a moment, like Jack Nicholson's character in "The Shining") or I'll get a bunch of fans on my review going, "OMG, how could you not love this you read too much into it you hating hater!"
Quentin is a
I can't even write a plot summary without my disgust of our main character squeezing through. I hate Quentin. I hate Quentin more than I've EVER hated ANY fictional character. I hate Quentin more than Bella Swan, Edward Cullen, Jondalar, Jacob from Miss Peregrine's (AND I HATE JACOB) and quite possibly even Anita Blake. (YES ANITA BLAKE!) I often say I can like a book with a unlikable character, and that is true. Hence why this book isn't 1-star (which I considered because I hated Quentin THAT MUCH). But Quentin's endless pessimism, negativity, sexism, misogyny, and general misanthropy nearly made me rage-quit this book.
And his treatment of Alice! Alice may have been a wimp, but let's put this out there: Quentin cheated on his girlfriend. He may have been drunk, but he knew damned well what he was doing. He'd been thinking about it ALL NIGHT. So when he gets his panties in a knot at Alice's treatment and her relationship with Penny - I got no sympathy for you Quentin! You are angry at the wrong person - you cheated ON HER. I don't care if you are sorry, you effed up bad. You made your bed; LIE IN IT.
(And it was after that scene and how the journey to Fillory got wrecked because of Quentin's whinging about Alice "cheating on him" that nearly made me ragequit the book.)
BUT. BUT.
If you could extricate Quentin from this book, it's actually really good. Sure, none of the characters are that great (though Alice and Penny are my favorites), but the story and world are interesting. I love the subtle jabs and satire at how ridiculous Narnia could be (I like Narnia, but I've always found the Christian allegory too heavy-handed). I love how fantasy novels and stories in general are chided for ridiculous rules - why do I have to go to X place and retrieve Y for Z to happen?
Of course, even ignoring the Most Despicable Fictional Character, I thought the book bit off more than it could chew. I got the impression it would focus on Magical University Life. Well, yes, it does, but only a rather small portion of the book. There are multiple other plots and subplots that come up, diluting the focus (IMO).
I already bought the sequel on ebook, so I guess I'll have to read it one of these days. Hopefully, Quentin isn't as much of a loser. I really wanted to love and adore this book to bits, but if I had to say one thing that dropped this from 4 stars to 2, it was Quentin.
sbhumphreys's review
1.0
Wow. Where do I even begin describing how much I detest this book? The show is better, which turns out wasn’t that hard to accomplish. The use of metaphor was tiring and frankly bad. Not everything has to be described with a metaphor, especially when the metaphor is grasping at being profound, but is really just stupid word salad. This is probably petty, but the use of the word “fetish” instead of “trinket” or “talisman” was always jarring, but continued repeatedly through the book. There are a few other examples of word being thrown in like that where I think either someone needs to take away the author’s thesaurus, or he used it for the shock value. I’m inclined to think it’s the shock value considering the rest of my complaints about this book.
The women are primarily described in physical, sexualized ways, no matter how intelligent or talented they are, which is wild since they’re far more interesting than the main character. It wouldn’t bother me if physical descriptions were also provided for male characters, but they largely aren’t in a glaring way. And the main character is so possessive over a woman who does not need him and is way better than him in an uncomfortable way. The main character of a book doesn’t have to be (arguably shouldn’t be) perfect, but way too much time was spent on him describing how he was moping and how mad he was that she moved on after he cheated on her. He really took us through all the stages of grief, and he did it in the most drawn out, unsympathetic way. Honestly, the best part of the book was that she moved on until she said it was bad and regretted how it hurt him. Like, girl no. And then she gets fridged while defeating the villain. You really do get the full experience of ways to mistreat female characters, so that’s something.
In no way is this book “gritty Harry Potter.” The first half of the book is just roughly glossing over most of the schooling. It’s way closer a “gritty Narnia,” but somehow failing at both. The villain is introduced at some point in the beginning, completely dropped, shows back up in the last five chapters, monologues how he got there, and dies. The characters were only aware of him in 3 chapters. What he was doing had little to no effect on the plot. The plot often felt non existent. The chapters are very episodic but not in a way that feels like it’s arriving to a coherent point. Really there wasn’t a coherent point that I can find, but it also took me over a month to slog through this mess, so maybe I missed it.
All the shape shifting and vague bestiality was what it was I guess. It was largely unnecessary. Really was probably just there for shock value, and I’m sure it was just added for “the grit.” I really hate shock art. It’s lazy, and I really don’t think it had the intended effect.
Don’t even get me started on the use of the words “retarded” and “autistic” either. Somehow this book managed to go from simply boring to arguably vile in the span of a few chapters. If I had to guess, the author thought it would be “super gritty” to try to talk about mental health and neurodivergent tendencies, but he really mishandled it. The main character is coded as depressed, but it only really comes into play when he’s wallowing. It just feels like a gross oversimplification of depression. And the other two words are only used to describe characters who are presented as annoying doing annoying things.
The more time I spend writing this, the more ridiculous and stupid and just bad things I remember. I’m not even kidding when I say the main character, the one whose eyes we’re seeing the story through, is bored by the story. Really, don’t waste your time.
ETA: I just remembered the use of the word “holocaust” to describe the fallout after the main character cheats on his girlfriend. I cannot; this book it truly the worst.
The women are primarily described in physical, sexualized ways, no matter how intelligent or talented they are, which is wild since they’re far more interesting than the main character. It wouldn’t bother me if physical descriptions were also provided for male characters, but they largely aren’t in a glaring way. And the main character is so possessive over a woman who does not need him and is way better than him in an uncomfortable way. The main character of a book doesn’t have to be (arguably shouldn’t be) perfect, but way too much time was spent on him describing how he was moping and how mad he was that she moved on after he cheated on her. He really took us through all the stages of grief, and he did it in the most drawn out, unsympathetic way. Honestly, the best part of the book was that she moved on until she said it was bad and regretted how it hurt him. Like, girl no. And then she gets fridged while defeating the villain. You really do get the full experience of ways to mistreat female characters, so that’s something.
In no way is this book “gritty Harry Potter.” The first half of the book is just roughly glossing over most of the schooling. It’s way closer a “gritty Narnia,” but somehow failing at both. The villain is introduced at some point in the beginning, completely dropped, shows back up in the last five chapters, monologues how he got there, and dies. The characters were only aware of him in 3 chapters. What he was doing had little to no effect on the plot. The plot often felt non existent. The chapters are very episodic but not in a way that feels like it’s arriving to a coherent point. Really there wasn’t a coherent point that I can find, but it also took me over a month to slog through this mess, so maybe I missed it.
All the shape shifting and vague bestiality was what it was I guess. It was largely unnecessary. Really was probably just there for shock value, and I’m sure it was just added for “the grit.” I really hate shock art. It’s lazy, and I really don’t think it had the intended effect.
Don’t even get me started on the use of the words “retarded” and “autistic” either. Somehow this book managed to go from simply boring to arguably vile in the span of a few chapters. If I had to guess, the author thought it would be “super gritty” to try to talk about mental health and neurodivergent tendencies, but he really mishandled it. The main character is coded as depressed, but it only really comes into play when he’s wallowing. It just feels like a gross oversimplification of depression. And the other two words are only used to describe characters who are presented as annoying doing annoying things.
The more time I spend writing this, the more ridiculous and stupid and just bad things I remember. I’m not even kidding when I say the main character, the one whose eyes we’re seeing the story through, is bored by the story. Really, don’t waste your time.
ETA: I just remembered the use of the word “holocaust” to describe the fallout after the main character cheats on his girlfriend. I cannot; this book it truly the worst.
osean93's review
adventurous
dark
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
evelynreads87's review
3.0
I wanted to give this a 3.5 but wasn’t sure how! I did really enjoy this but the reviews gave me a false idea of what this book was actually about.
The first 40% of the book covers four whole years of magic school and the whole plot is mostly focused on the Narnia-Esqe world of Fillory.
I love the characters, in particular Alice, Quentin and Eliot but I found that overall all the characters are quite damaged and depressed, all having their own demons. Fillory appears to be an escape from the real world, expecting a fantasy and exciting world and finding quite the opposite.
I think this book is about what it is to be human, and the lifelong obsession to find peace and happiness and a strong feeling of existential crisis throughout!
The first 40% of the book covers four whole years of magic school and the whole plot is mostly focused on the Narnia-Esqe world of Fillory.
I love the characters, in particular Alice, Quentin and Eliot but I found that overall all the characters are quite damaged and depressed, all having their own demons. Fillory appears to be an escape from the real world, expecting a fantasy and exciting world and finding quite the opposite.
I think this book is about what it is to be human, and the lifelong obsession to find peace and happiness and a strong feeling of existential crisis throughout!