The Magicians: A Novel

disturbinglynic

Realistic and gritty

"I adore this book. It is one of my all time favorites. Reading it again was a treat. I’m already wondering when I’ll have time to read it again, along with the rest of the trilogy. The trilogy itself is an all time favorite, but this book will always have a special place in my heart. I have always shipped Quentin/Eliot and going through the story again it's not all that surprising. Quentin spends a good portion of the book, if not all of it, obsessed with Eliot. He also seems to look up to Eliot. He has a very different relationship with Eliot. We know they've at least kissed, but did something more happen that night? I like to think it did. It makes me unbelievably happy to think that way so I will stick with it. I never did enjoy the Quentin/Alice relationship. It was very self-destructive and it felt like they were going down the same path that Alice’s parents were, which was something Alice didn’t want to do, but neither of them could see it. They were terrible together. However, as much as I don’t ship them and I don’t think they belong together, I love that this relationship is in the book. It felt like an important part of Quentin's journey. Quentin is an a-hole. For the most part, he is a very unlikeable character. He is horribly unhappy and he is always waiting for something more to happen with his life. He is never satisfied with what he has. And when he gets something he thinks is going to make him happy, he tosses it to the side. Honestly it's part of what makes this book so fun. It's from Quentin's POV. He's very blah as a person but he's so wonderfully written. Not that any of the other characters are necessarily people you want to be friends with. But it works here. Their friendships and their personalities? They are real. Eliot is my favorite. I always want more Eliot, and more than that, I always want more interactions between Eliot and Quentin. There is just something about those two. Even if it’s not the sex scenes that I’m dying to see, there’s an undeniable chemistry between Quentin and Eliot. One of my most favorite things about this book is the magic itself. It's a lot of HARD WORK. Magic always seems too easy in books, even when the characters have to work for it. They don't have to work for it like they do in The Magicians. They work their butts off for some of the most simple spells, until it does become easy for them to do. It's like a combination of Harry Potter and The Chronicles of Narnia for adults, but it's also not. There's something more to it, and there's definitely something darker to it. There’s also something more real to it. It’s a fantasy, yes, but not only are they dealing with magic in a very real way, but they are also dealing with problems that people deal with on a daily basis. And while other books like Harry Potter might touch on more real life problems, it still doesn’t have that gritty feel like The Magicians does. Harry Potter is definitely fantasy. The Magicians could be happening right now to people that you know. Like I said, one of my favorite books ever. I couldn't even really tell you why. There's just something special about for me. It speaks to me. ["

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August 3, 2014 Verified Purchase

Amazon Customer

... hard to know where to start with a book like Lev Grossman’s The Magicians

"It’s hard to know where to start with a book like Lev Grossman’s The Magicians. I have never read a book that has given me such mixed feelings. And by mixed feelings, I don’t mean “meh, it was ok”. I mean parts of it were absolutely brilliant, so brilliant that I find the main character Quentin is still hanging around in my head. And parts of it made me so mad that I wanted to put the book down and never pick it up again. The people and relationships that Grossman describes are probably the most realistic I’ve ever seen in the context of a fantasy novel. The main character, Quentin, is moody, depressed, selfish, and a genius who gets to fulfill the average fantasy reader’s greatest dream: Attending a school for magic in place of a normal college. Make no mistake, this is no harry potter tale, because the twist (which isn’t really a spoiler to anyone who is old enough to have graduated from college) is that even though his most secret and unrealistic dream comes true, Quentin is still depressed moody and selfish thereby exposing the myth that circumstances can dictate long term happiness. Grossman subverts the standard “going to magic school for training” narrative in a way that can only be compared to what Alan Moor to does to the standard super hero narrative in The Watchmen. That is, Grossman flips it on its head a tells it in a way that fulfills a lot of the tropes associated with the narrative but because Quentin is so very opposite of Harry Potter a weird upside down sort of tale forms that in the end feels way more realistic. Quentin finds all the magic he could possibly dream of, and it still he can’t be happy, or not for long, then he finds his way into the secondary fantasy world he has always dreamed of, and after the shine wears off he is still not happy, not fulfilled, feels a lack of purpose. The hero is supposed to live happily ever after, not get everything he/she ever wanted and then be unsatisfied. It is made even worse from the reader’s perspective because you can see the real, meaningful things in his life that Quentin just cannot, or will not, recognize. The unwritten refrain in Quentin’s head through the whole novel is “this is not how the story is supposed to go” so he continues searching, thinking there has to be more somehow, somewhere there must be a place where the world is not screwed up, or where Quentin has not screwed it up himself. But by waiting and hoping for that single non-existent something, everything else slips quietly away from him in a bleary haze of booze, and self-pity. There are a number of brilliant scenes interspersed throughout the novel that show just how deep Quentin’s issues go. These scenes, most times, depict Quentin catching one of his friends or acquaintances in their own moments of quiet despair, wrapped in their own self centric narratives. But Quentin is so inwardly focused that he cannot see it. It would force him to recognize that he is not the center of every story. I think these few scenes carry an extra emotional punch because other than this, they seem to have no purpose in the book whatsoever. And so the reader reacts in the same way Quentin reacts, with a little bit of confusion and a lack of understanding, until of course, unlike Quentin, the reader does eventually understand if they are paying attention. This strikes a number of personal chords with me, and maybe that is why I think this novel is so brilliant. I could almost forgive any writerly sin (and there a few in this book) for the unexpected vitality, and sheer weight and realness of the characters. However, I am not sure I can forgive him for the simple, unsubtle way he has ripped out some major chunks of The Chronicles of Narnia’s world and to a lesser extent the Harry Potter universe and plunked them down in his story barely altered. I won’t go into too much detail here, but basically Brakebills is the same as Hogwarts with less of a sense of wonder about it, and Fillory basically is Narnia. I would say Fillory is Narnia, but darker, however I think the actual Narnia can be pretty dark on its own in places. In speculative fiction, it is an often used practice to pull bits and pieces of setting or world building from The Greats and twist them around a little bit before use by an author in a new story. This is fine because usually you can sense that the authors have treated the source material with reverence, and by doing so treats the fandom with respect as well. This comes off to the average genre reader as a nod of respect and gratitude to “those who have gone before”. I can’t count how many times I have found references to Kurt Vonnegut, or Harlan Ellison, or any of a hundred other men and women who have made genre what it is today, hidden in some new book that I have recently picked up. And I love it when I find those Easter eggs. It gives me sense of belonging in a way. I say all of this I guess because if giving a nod to Harry Potter and Narnia is what Grossman did, I would have been absolutely fine with it. Instead, especially with Narnia, Grossman made a blatant copy of it. Right down to the “in between” place as a stopping point on the way to “Fillory”, and only two girls and two boys from our world can be kings and queens of “Fillory”. Fillory just feels very irreverent to the original Narnia, and for some reason makes me feel very protective of the original. I get what Grossman is doing, at least I think I do: If you went to Narnia, it wouldn’t be at all the way you imagined it would be. However, I feel that he could have shown this just as easily by making up a world that diverged from Narnia in a significant way. Anyway, in summary: It’s easy for me to see why most of the reviews for this book are either five stars or one star. I am on the fence as well, but I think that in the end, Grossman’s skill as a writer wins out. ["

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August 14, 2014 Verified Purchase

shot

Lev needs to work on his endings

"I loved this book while I was reading it. The story was well paced, with a story that seemed to expertly choose from Narnia and Potter to make something with a very original direction. It was refreshing to have characters cracking under the pressure of intense schooling, and it reminded me a little of law school. Maybe my favorite part was the writing. There are several passages that are clever, engaging, and looked like the writer had a blast writing it. Related to this is the really active way in which he engages the theme of giving incredible power a small group of elite, secretive people. This happens several times, when the dean gives a speech and when we see the listless, grown-up magicians. I stopped loving this book after having to read the horrible ending. After that, the spell was broken, so to speak, and much of the novel began to unravel. First, the ending. It was like the ending to an awful movie that is just praying to make enough money to feed a sequel. He wants a sequel, that's fine. End it at the Questing Beast and then pick up the second book at the office job. But the window blowing out and the flying friends? I feel like he was maybe even ridiculing the reader, saying "so you suckers thought you could take a fantasy novel seriously? Well, here's the gay character, only now he's got angel wings! And for no reason, here's a skinny goth girl that up to till now has had roughly 20 pages where she was mostly just a lust object!" Easily the worst ending I've ever read. Second, the Quentin/Alice relationship never quite seemed as deep as the author wanted us to believe. I always saw it as a relationship of convenience and figured they would break up after school. What attracted them to each other, other than proximity? They're both smart and driven, I guess. But do they have any other similar interests? She seems to know everything about him (or just knows everything, another problem) and he knows nothing about her, her moods, or what she wants. So what does he love about her? We're never told. In the last third, he loves her simply because the author says so, because the main character always has to have a love interest, and that's very unsatisfying. Third, too much unexplained, inconsistent stuff. If magic is done by flexing your fingers and muttering certain words, why does the magic Quentin did at the beginning work? What is Quentin's specialty in magic? How is it that all the schoolteachers can't defeat the beast when it comes to the school but Alice can hold her own against it? The real problem isn't that these questions aren't answered, it's that they aren't considered at all. Quentin doesn't go around asking the history of magic prof, how could I have done magic in such a weird way? They marvel at Alice's skill, but no one questions it or thinks of how she's misrepresented herself to them. The issue of his specialty in magic is brought up in the crappy ending, but that's in the crappy ending and not helpful. Finally, and most irresponsibly, the theme of how dangerous it is to be aimless and powerful was completely undermined by the ending. The Magicians is an analogy to the extremely wealthy and privileged. The school is an Ivy League college. The power and aimlessness the students feel when they leave is akin to what the very wealthy go through, since they don't have to get jobs. One must find meaning in one's life. This is what Alice keeps going on about. Yet, by the end, the characters are ready to go off on another wacky, decadent adventure, like trust fund kids looking to have fun at a remote resort in a third world country. The flying and angel wings and all that suggest that despite their intense experiences together, they don't take the world seriously at all. To sum it up, I'm really disappointed by how badly Grossman dropped the ball. Hopefully he gets a new editor for the sequel. ["

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November 27, 2010 Verified Purchase

Nickolas X. P. Sharps

"Sure you can live out your dreams but..."

"I gave up reading fantasy, roughly around five years ago. At the time the genre was teaming with Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings knock offs. Just last year I rediscovered my long lost love with Joe Abercrombie's First Law Trilogy and I have been playing catch up ever since. Lev Grossman's The Magicians is to Harry Potter what the First Law Trilogy is to Lord of the Rings. The Magicians is a darker, more adult themed look at fantasy and perhaps the best book I read all year. Quentin Coldwater is an intelligent introvert who buries himself in a series of children's fantasy books to escape the miserable real world. One day he gets an invitation to attend a college dedicated to the study of magic. Just when it seems that Quentin's dreams may finally be coming true he realizes that magic may not be so magical after all. Life at Brakebills College for Magical Pedagogy has a mundane edge to it, complete with late night study cramming and adolescent hedonism. So begins the story of The Magicians, the ultimate coming-of-age tale for anyone who ever waited anxiously for an owl delivered invitation to Hogwart's that never came. I found in Quentin an immediately relatable character. Romantic at heart, Quentin keeps searching for happiness, going through all the necessary rituals without ever getting the desired results. Quentin is fully human. He makes mistakes. He makes stupid, ignorant, awful mistakes. Half way through the novel I got so angry with Quentin that I wasn't sure I wanted to read on. Until I realized where my anger stemmed from. Quentin is a real person, he is flawed and believable and I honestly couldn't remember the last time I have been so absorbed in a character. Quentin's relationships with his peers drive the story along. Each member of his little group are screwed up to some degree but while some people may find it off-putting I found it to be endearing. Lev Grossman's portrayal of magic is a breath of fresh air. Some fantasy books have no rules at all that govern magic. Some fantasy books are far too strict and limiting with their magical laws. Grossman writes comfortably in the middle. Magic in The Magicians is rich and diverse with several branches. "Magic wasn't simply random, it had an actual shape - a fractal, chaotic shape..." The process of learning magic is hard, diligent work and the actual application of spells is far more complicated than saying a few latin words and waving a wand. Brakebills, and later Fillory, are fantasy worlds but with a very real world edge to them. The further down the rabbit hole Quentin goes the more obvious it becomes that there is a very dark side to magic. There are some very chilling moments in this book that ground what wonderment there is to be found. As I described it to a friend, The Magicians is like a Narnia without the Christian overtones and add a dash of Lovecraft (a very very light dash but still). There is action, intrigue, suspense, dark humor, and romance in spades. The Magicians even lumps in a dose of philosophy. The Magicians is the best fantasy book I have ever read. Lev Grossman celebrates the classics like Lewis and Rowling while turning the genre on its head and giving it a dose of realism. Plenty of critics have described it as "literature fiction" but I find the term rather snobby and inaccurate. The Magicians is extremely well written in terms of plot and prose but I feel like "literature" generally means boring and pretentious as hell. The Magicians is neither of these things. Instead it is an exciting, compelling, immersive story about the tragedy of living out child hood fantasies as grown ups. Whenever someone finishes up The Deathly Hallows and sighs sadly, "What next?" Smile and hand them a copy of The Magicians. They'll appreciate it. ["

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December 30, 2011 Verified Purchase

Jennifer Buchanan

This is what happens to Narnia Nerds when they grow up... and by Aslan it's magi-licious!

"The Magicians and The Magician King, are two incredibly ambitious novels by Lev Grossman, which reference, borrow from, and pay homage to some of the most beloved fantasy stories in the Western Canon. The Chronicles of Narnia, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Arthurian legend, Greek mythology... all of these and more make an appearance in one form or another in Grossman's two book series. (Is it meant to eventually be three books? I certainly hope so.) I consider myself pretty well versed in the fantasy/mythology genre, but I bow to Grossman's superior knowledge. With his main character (named Quentin) Grossman has created someone who is your typical genius level, somewhat socially out-of-place, fantasy loving young adult. This is the same kind of person I imagine will love this book, and quite possibly the same kind of person Grossman was himself at one time. During the course of the first few chapters Quentin is recruited, tested, and admitted into Brakebills, an out-of-place and out-of-time college for young magicians. Our main character spends the first half of the book at Brakebills; learning about magic, making friends, and falling in love. This first half of the book is a delight; the pace is brisk, the story is compelling, the characters are charming. The second half of the book takes a very different and darker turn. Suddenly our brilliant young magicians are out of college, and freedom does not agree with them. Without the challenge of professors and "schoolwork" to keep them going, and without the need to earn a living like all the non-magical working-class schmucks, Quentin and his friends deteriorate quickly into a life of unsatisfying hedonism. Eventually they rally together with a common purpose: to find a way into the magical land of Fillory, the setting for a popular series of fantasy novels they all knew and loved as children. One of the things that makes this book so enjoyable is how utterly familiar it is in many ways. I couldn't read three pages in succession without thrilling to find a little literary "in" joke or a reference to a well-loved story from my childhood. Brakebills is like Hogwarts for the college set, but with a much lesser level of thought and detail. And while Brakebills may not be the same looming presence--almost a character in and of itself--in The Magician King as Hogwarts is in Harry Potter, I don't think it's meant to be. The real looming presence in this book is the fantastical and magical land of Fillory, and the story that surrounds it. Fillory is very obviously a stand-in for C.S. Lewis' land of Narnia, and the fantasy series the characters in the novel refer to--Fillory and Further--is almost an exact replica of Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia. While some people might (and I believe have) complained that such blatant use of a well-known story should be considered plagiarism, I have to disagree in this case. Grossman's Fillory doesn't even attempt to stand on its own. It is so obviously meant to be Narnia that it could never be plagiarism, it must be homage. By recreating a world based on one that was so well-known and beloved to his target audience Grossman transfers the spotlight in the story away from the fantasy world itself and puts it on the reactions of his characters to this world... this spotlight is subsequently put on the readers themselves, who are almost certainly as addicted to magic and fantasy as Grossman's characters are. (As a proud magic and fantasy junkie myself I say this with the utmost respect.) Far from being lazy or unimaginative, which is ultimately what plagiarism is, Grossman's novel is extremely clever and reflexive. It gives adult fantasy lovers not only a well-written fantasy to enjoy, but also the opportunity to remember the love and longing we had for those transportive stories of our youth, how they inspired us back then, and how they continue to affect us today. ["

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March 15, 2012 Verified Purchase