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3.43 AVERAGE
3.43 AVERAGE
I loved it for the first 300 pages, to the point I repeatedly declared this was the best book ever, and then it went all sword-and-sorcery and spun out of control. I knew it had to go that way eventually but I had higher hopes for how Lev Grossman would treat it or how I would tolerate it. I tolerate fantasy a lot better in children's books than in adult ones and I had lost patience with the Narnian critters well before the Tolkien demon showed up. And the ending was unresolved in an unsatisfactory way -- I can handle books that don't give a happy ending with all threads raveled, but this just felt like a gaping sequel-ready hole that allowed the protagonist to avoid the honest, existential issues that had confronted him.
I loved it because it stole from Narnia and reminded me of Pamela Dean's Tam Lin (school, loving school, not wanting to leave school, the "anticipatory nostalgia" before graduation, all of which I empathize with) and Mysterious Benedict Society (the examination) and Earthsea (having to know the balance of magic and adjust it to the world) and Winter's Tale (the mysterious place in upstate New York) and Secret History (the cloistering of those who specialize in something arcane). I love that Harry Potter books existed in this world to be mocked (that spells consisted of more than messed up Latin, that something was going to arrive in a chariot pulled by a threstral, welters as quidditch). I love that Grossman had someone use a phrase from Infinite Jest (the "howling fantods"). I love that Quentin's reaction to humanity after leaving the centaurs was like Gulliver's upon leaving the Houyhnhnms.
Nitpicks: Almost all the prose was lovely and alliterative but occasionally it squinted or had proofreading errors: "It took Quentin a minute for his eyes to adjust," "inspite," and a piece of sentence that ran "[subject:] did a lot of for [object:]."
One bit where Grossman revealed himself to be a New Yorker's New Yorker was when the group was in the different upstate New York place, where they were within a day's easy out-and-back driving distance to Buffalo for errands yet east of the Adirondacks (they watched the sun set behind the mountains).
I loved it because it stole from Narnia and reminded me of Pamela Dean's Tam Lin (school, loving school, not wanting to leave school, the "anticipatory nostalgia" before graduation, all of which I empathize with) and Mysterious Benedict Society (the examination) and Earthsea (having to know the balance of magic and adjust it to the world) and Winter's Tale (the mysterious place in upstate New York) and Secret History (the cloistering of those who specialize in something arcane). I love that Harry Potter books existed in this world to be mocked (that spells consisted of more than messed up Latin, that something was going to arrive in a chariot pulled by a threstral, welters as quidditch). I love that Grossman had someone use a phrase from Infinite Jest (the "howling fantods"). I love that Quentin's reaction to humanity after leaving the centaurs was like Gulliver's upon leaving the Houyhnhnms.
Nitpicks: Almost all the prose was lovely and alliterative but occasionally it squinted or had proofreading errors: "It took Quentin a minute for his eyes to adjust," "inspite," and a piece of sentence that ran "[subject:] did a lot of for [object:]."
One bit where Grossman revealed himself to be a New Yorker's New Yorker was when the group was in the different upstate New York place, where they were within a day's easy out-and-back driving distance to Buffalo for errands yet east of the Adirondacks (they watched the sun set behind the mountains).
I'm not sure why I liked this book as much as I did. It's half Harry Potter and half the Chronicles of Narnia, with college students instead of grade schoolers, retold by an author I can only assume is a jaded, sarcastic hipster, and narrated by a teenager/young adult so utterly insufferable that I preemptively apologised to everyone I knew at that age for even the limited extent that I resembled him.
And yet...and yet.
I enjoy the look at just how one might try and live in our world with the power to do anything you wanted - try, and so often fail. I found myself laughing constantly at the sharp dialogue between the Physical Kids as they haltingly found their way through and past their schooling, found myself caught in the grip of a page-turning narrative once the book finally decided to have a plot, both fantastic and grimly real.
In the end, when I finished this one I cursed aloud because I knew there was a sequel and I knew I would never be able to resist it, for all the darkness and nihilism to come. I imagine that is sign enough of a job well done.
And yet...and yet.
I enjoy the look at just how one might try and live in our world with the power to do anything you wanted - try, and so often fail. I found myself laughing constantly at the sharp dialogue between the Physical Kids as they haltingly found their way through and past their schooling, found myself caught in the grip of a page-turning narrative once the book finally decided to have a plot, both fantastic and grimly real.
In the end, when I finished this one I cursed aloud because I knew there was a sequel and I knew I would never be able to resist it, for all the darkness and nihilism to come. I imagine that is sign enough of a job well done.
This is a perfect example of why, once I start reading a book, I stick with it, even though I'm not thoroughly enjoying it. The first 300 pages of this book meander and plod along. But then the last 100 pages are absolutely perfect.
At some point in the development of a writer, you have to stop reading and start writing. Many writers find it difficult to write in their own style if they are simultaneously reading something very stylistic, as most writers are mimics--a thing that comes in quite handy when you are trying to write about characters very unlike you, but awkward in the case I'm describing where you unconsciously start copying another writer's style. This isn't confined to writers, of course, as musicians, painters, and most likely artists of any other stripe find that to create their own original work, they have to isolate themselves so that the influences aren't quite so immediate.
Which makes it quite difficult for writers to work certain jobs, the worst being that of book critic or reviewer. Lev Grossman is the book critic for the news magazine, Time, and this is his second novel. I didn't read his first, Codex, but glancing at it recently in the bookstore, it was obviously marketed to the same folks who enjoyed the Dan Brown books (I can't say it's deriviative of Brown, as I didn't read the thing, as I said). This one, The Magicians, is very obviously a deriviative of the Harry Potter books crossed with C.S. Lewis's Narnia, and I might have dismissed it offhand if I hadn't seen some comments from people whose opinion I trust that said it was worthwhile. While they mentioned that it was "Harry Potter for adults," they noted that it transcended its source material.
Rather than transcend, I think The Magicians is actually a meta-fictional commentary on its influences, while retaining enough of an interesting story line that if you don't care about thinking in such ways, you don't have to. Grossman clearly takes on themes that Rowling avoided in her books, including much more believable turns on alienation and sexuality. There's also an implied criticism of C.S. Lewis's simplistic moralistic and structured adventures, and a devil of a villain that comes close to being original except that I think I've seen all of his special effects in horror/fantasy movies of the last decade.
I enjoyed the book quite a lot, but I would hesitate to suggest it to lovers of either of its major influences if they can't stand a bit of criticism, which seems appropriate in context, given Grossman's day job.
Which makes it quite difficult for writers to work certain jobs, the worst being that of book critic or reviewer. Lev Grossman is the book critic for the news magazine, Time, and this is his second novel. I didn't read his first, Codex, but glancing at it recently in the bookstore, it was obviously marketed to the same folks who enjoyed the Dan Brown books (I can't say it's deriviative of Brown, as I didn't read the thing, as I said). This one, The Magicians, is very obviously a deriviative of the Harry Potter books crossed with C.S. Lewis's Narnia, and I might have dismissed it offhand if I hadn't seen some comments from people whose opinion I trust that said it was worthwhile. While they mentioned that it was "Harry Potter for adults," they noted that it transcended its source material.
Rather than transcend, I think The Magicians is actually a meta-fictional commentary on its influences, while retaining enough of an interesting story line that if you don't care about thinking in such ways, you don't have to. Grossman clearly takes on themes that Rowling avoided in her books, including much more believable turns on alienation and sexuality. There's also an implied criticism of C.S. Lewis's simplistic moralistic and structured adventures, and a devil of a villain that comes close to being original except that I think I've seen all of his special effects in horror/fantasy movies of the last decade.
I enjoyed the book quite a lot, but I would hesitate to suggest it to lovers of either of its major influences if they can't stand a bit of criticism, which seems appropriate in context, given Grossman's day job.
This book has so much good in it, so much that I liked and enjoyed but it also took me forever to read. I felt the author and the novel fighting each other all the way along. The relentlessness of the pessimism, the need to present the negative/realistic version of every conceivable fantasy trope got in the way of what was essentially a very good story.
What a disappointment!! The beginning (read via Kindle free sample) was SO GOOD, I got inordinately excited and bought the book. Big mistake--it quickly devolved into THE dullest account of a magical high school EVER. Like, even if it had been about a REGULAR high school it would have been dull. I couldn't finish it, I will admit.
An amazing story, but holy heck Quentin is such an annoying narrator.
2.5ish? Maybe?
I'm really conflicted about this book because I DID enjoy it quite a bit, but I sort of have the distinct feeling that it's not something I would have gotten into enough to actually finish, but I had a pre-attachment to the characters/concept from the tv adaptation and I think I was pre-invested because I'd already been introduced to the world, so it mattered a lot less that it wasn't particularly compelling. It's not that it's bad, it's mostly just paced so weirdly and is so expository that it detracts from some of the really cool things the book is doing.
Putting so much emphasis on Brakebills and cultivating that magical world entirely in it only to really use it as an expository tool to get us to boredom post-grad 20 somethings when that's such a relatively short part of the first book was weird. So many things happen essentially off screen and we just hear about it in really long descriptive bits which are gorgeous but sort of boring. Quentin's intensely unlikeable, which isn't always a bad thing, but couple-ing it with how "special" he gets to be (no discernible discipline, moving up a year) is off putting sometimes, and it sort of feels like his characterization is "I go out of my way to be a dick." He has to be empathetic on some level, and for me, that never really happened. And because Quentin was really hard for me to connect to (even though, surface level, I really felt like I should, and I hate to bring the show up here because it doesn't really matter, but that version of Quentin's insecurities and depression and escapist tendencies are relatable even though I still want to shake him constantly), having the book in his POV entirely and limiting the characterization of the other way more compelling characters like Eliot and Janet and Alice was rough for me.
I do really really love the thematic concept behind this though. I love fantasy, and this felt like one gigantic meta commentary on escapism, and provided a really realistic look at grappling with expectations vs reality? I really connected to Eliot's journey, and I really loved seeing a lot of the fantasy elements through the lens of modern twenty-somethings running around with swords and swearing--it worked REALLY well.
Overall I liked the book a lot, and plan to finish the trilogy, there were just a lot of misses in a really great concept.
I'm really conflicted about this book because I DID enjoy it quite a bit, but I sort of have the distinct feeling that it's not something I would have gotten into enough to actually finish, but I had a pre-attachment to the characters/concept from the tv adaptation and I think I was pre-invested because I'd already been introduced to the world, so it mattered a lot less that it wasn't particularly compelling. It's not that it's bad, it's mostly just paced so weirdly and is so expository that it detracts from some of the really cool things the book is doing.
Putting so much emphasis on Brakebills and cultivating that magical world entirely in it only to really use it as an expository tool to get us to boredom post-grad 20 somethings when that's such a relatively short part of the first book was weird. So many things happen essentially off screen and we just hear about it in really long descriptive bits which are gorgeous but sort of boring. Quentin's intensely unlikeable, which isn't always a bad thing, but couple-ing it with how "special" he gets to be (no discernible discipline, moving up a year) is off putting sometimes, and it sort of feels like his characterization is "I go out of my way to be a dick." He has to be empathetic on some level, and for me, that never really happened. And because Quentin was really hard for me to connect to (even though, surface level, I really felt like I should, and I hate to bring the show up here because it doesn't really matter, but that version of Quentin's insecurities and depression and escapist tendencies are relatable even though I still want to shake him constantly), having the book in his POV entirely and limiting the characterization of the other way more compelling characters like Eliot and Janet and Alice was rough for me.
I do really really love the thematic concept behind this though. I love fantasy, and this felt like one gigantic meta commentary on escapism, and provided a really realistic look at grappling with expectations vs reality? I really connected to Eliot's journey, and I really loved seeing a lot of the fantasy elements through the lens of modern twenty-somethings running around with swords and swearing--it worked REALLY well.
Overall I liked the book a lot, and plan to finish the trilogy, there were just a lot of misses in a really great concept.
The Magicians by Lev Grossman was one of the few books recommended to me recently that I picked up and didn’t shortly put back down. I downloaded the sample chapters for iPhone Kindle, and while I didn’t feel exactly swept away by the narrative, it seemed well written and like it might actually contain some elements of the sort of escapist fantasy I used to enjoy as a kid.
Yeah.
So turns out the teenage protag who gets swept off to magic school ala Hogwarts crossed with a snooty Ivy League college isn’t much of a hero. I don’t really have a problem with this, as a reader, having read and loved some serious anti-heroes in my day. Turns out he’s not really an anti-hero, either. He’s just a grumpy, alcoholic, drugged out idiot who isn’t good for much through the majority of the story and in the end still isn’t good for much.
This was a vastly disappointing read, with an ending that was not so much bittersweet as… well, just plainly bitter. The good guys don’t win, because you never meet anyone who’d really qualify. You don’t escape to the reality of a fantastical world, because the entire theme of the book is that fantasy is EVIL and will kill you and the people you care about.
It feels like the author’s entire intent was to seduce readers of fantasy with a story that started out looking kind of promising only so he could lecture them about what utter fucking failures they were as human beings for reading fantasy.
Not my cuppa, thanks.
Yeah.
So turns out the teenage protag who gets swept off to magic school ala Hogwarts crossed with a snooty Ivy League college isn’t much of a hero. I don’t really have a problem with this, as a reader, having read and loved some serious anti-heroes in my day. Turns out he’s not really an anti-hero, either. He’s just a grumpy, alcoholic, drugged out idiot who isn’t good for much through the majority of the story and in the end still isn’t good for much.
This was a vastly disappointing read, with an ending that was not so much bittersweet as… well, just plainly bitter. The good guys don’t win, because you never meet anyone who’d really qualify. You don’t escape to the reality of a fantastical world, because the entire theme of the book is that fantasy is EVIL and will kill you and the people you care about.
It feels like the author’s entire intent was to seduce readers of fantasy with a story that started out looking kind of promising only so he could lecture them about what utter fucking failures they were as human beings for reading fantasy.
Not my cuppa, thanks.
Unlike so many others, I was unimpressed. The story is a mash-up of C. S. Lewis and J. K. Rowling peopled by foul-mouthed, sexually promiscuous, alcoholic, drug abusing, self-obsessed college students who manage to remain unsympathetic throughout the story.