The Magicians by Lev Grossman is a novel about a bunch of kids who end up at a magic school—a daring feat (or author death wish) considering the world of Harry Potter hasn’t left our collective consciousness. But Grossman’s intention is to tie into the collective consciousness, in particular to the works of CS Lewis, Ursula LeGuin and JK Rowling. And he pulls it off. Grossman does, afterall, hold degrees in comparative literature from Harvard and Yale, and, based on writing style, is well versed in the traditions of modern fantasy and literary fiction.
Like Harry Potter, we have a couple of trios in the mix. Our main group being intellectually precocious high school senior Quentin Coldwater and his best friends James and Julia (who happen to be a couple). Quentin is our Harry, James and Julia our Ron and Hermione. But this trio doesn’t quite work out.
Quentin and James set off for their Princeton interviews. The interviewer turns up dead. The paramedic on scene is a bit odd and tries to give them envelopes with their names on them, and only Quentin accepts. Bonds are broken. Quentin moves to the next level.
The next level being an examination and then acceptance at Brakebills College for Magical Pedagogy.
The Magicians by Lev Grossman. Page 23
The test also changed as he took it. The reading-comprehension section showed him a paragraph that vanished as he read it, then quizzed him on its contents. Some new kind of computerized paper—hadn’t he read somewhere that somebody was working on that? Digital ink? Amazing resolution, though. He was asked to draw a rabbit that wouldn’t keepstill as he drew it—as soon as it had paws it scratched itself luxuriously and then went hopping off around the page, nibbling at the other questions, so that he had to chase it with the pencil to finish filling in the fur. He wound up pacifying it with some hastily sketched radishes and then drawing a fence around it to keep it in line.
The eventual threesome--pardon the pun because I mean it in the most virtuous way (for most of the book, anyway)--is Quentin, Alice and Penny. Penny is a punk, bad-ass, too-smart-for-school kind of guy. Alice is beside-herself shy and the smartest of the lot.
Brakebills is a college so these kids are a bit raunchier than the Harry Potter lot, but they are equally naive in the ways of magic. The lessons and structure of this magical world in Book 1 is by far my favourite part of the novel. By Book 2, Quentin and Alice have graduated and are slumming it in Manhattan. This particular section is my least favourite. Quentin turns from being this naive, wizard in training to an overindulged, laissez-faire idiot. (Strong writing, certainly. Q is such an ass that I almost gave up on him and his dumb friends, but Grossman pulled me back in with Book 3 and another round of adventure.)
I don't want to give too much plot away, but if you read CS Lewis, then there are some throwbacks to Narnia here that you'll really enjoy as the characters venture off to other worlds.
(Another of my favourite scenes is a conversation with Quentin and a drunk brown bear.)
Book completed, I'm looking forward to Grossman's next book (a bit unfair to demand more when he's only just finished touring for this one). C'est la vie!
The Magicians by Lev Grossman (Viking)
Posted by Monique at 04:04 PM. Filed under: Book Publisher • Viking • Book Reviews •
