"The Magicians"

Hi there! As Halloween is approaching and I needed to update the blog I decided to upload a new review of a book, which is far from being scary, but whose main characters are witches and wizards. I hope that whether you have watched its TV adaptation or not, you decide to give a chance to this amazing novel.

Enjoy the review!

SYNOPSIS:

“Quentin Coldwater is brilliant but miserable. A senior in high school, he’s still

secretly preoccupied with a series of fantasy novels he read as a child, set in a magical land called Fillory. Imagine his surprise when he finds himself unexpectedly admitted to a very secret, very exclusive college of magic in upstate New York, where he receives a thorough and rigorous education in the craft of modern sorcery.

He also discovers all the other things people learn in college: friendship, love, sex, booze, and boredom. Something is missing, though. Magic doesn’t bring Quentin the happiness and adventure he dreamed it would. After graduation he and his friends make a stunning discovery: Fillory is real. But the land of Quentin’s fantasies turns out to be much darker and more dangerous than he could have imagined. His childhood dream becomes a nightmare with a shocking truth at its heart”.

Credits to Goodreads.com

REVIEW:

“Quentin did a magic trick. Nobody noticed”. These simple words indicate the beginning of the adventures happening in Lev Grossman´s first book in his fantasy trilogy. After having watched the TV adaptation ( SyFy´s The Magicians) I couldn´t resist and I had to read the book of the adaptation that I binge watched. I had read different opinions about the book, but as I found the TV show so addicting I had to give it a chance.

Let me be honest, the book doesn´t disappoint. The readers bury themselves in Quentin´s life, a (almost) normal 18-year-old that has always lived obsessed with a series of books he used to read when he was younger, where its main protagonists travel to a Narnia like fantasy world, called Fillory.  Surprisingly, magic exists and so does Fillory, though it is not as Quentin and his friends had imagined.

The novel captures the reader from the first pages, introducing us to Brakebills, something like a Hogwarts University, where Quentin and his friends start to gain the skills to become great magicians. Grossman creates a reality where magicians and non-magical people coexist and get ready to start working.

In my opinion, the best thing about the novel is its characters. They differ from the typical characters in other sagas. All of them are complicated, with problems and also a little bit anti-heroic. We get to know Quentin, our main character, perfectionist and competitive, the sad, sweet and quiet Alice, moody Elliot, Josh the prankster, the eternal Prom Queen Janet or Penny, the outcast. These characters have their own virtues, but also their flaws. The truth is that I was quite fed up with all these characters in other novels that are simple, good and almost perfect. Give me the human, imperfect and ironic ones that can either love or destroy each other in a matter of seconds.

Regarding the plot, I would like to add that Grossman keeps the reader in suspense, either because of the relationship between characters, the weird exams they have to go through or due to the unexpected appearance of “The Beast”, who threatens to destroy the magical community.

To conclude, The Magicians is a really entertaining and absorbing novel, an adult Harry Potter, mixed with a fantasy-land similar to Narnia, sex and alcohol where nothing is as it seems. Of course, I will finish the saga at some point, as Grossman has created an original story for all of us that need to find in a book the ticket that leads us to a magical world.