Review – The Magician King

Read my thoughts on the first book–The Magicians–here. Warning, may have slight spoilers from the first book.

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Summary: Quentin and his friends are now the kings and queens of Fillory, but the days and nights of royal luxury are starting to pall. After a morning hunt takes a sinister turn, Quentin and his old friend Julia charter a magical sailing ship and set out on an errand to the wild outer reaches of their kingdom. Their pleasure cruise becomes an adventure when the two are unceremoniously dumped back into the last place Quentin ever wants to see: his parent’s house in Chesterton, Massachusetts. And only the black, twisted magic that Julia learned on the streets can save them.

The Magician King is a grand voyage into the dark, glittering heart of magic, an epic quest for the Harry Potter generation. It also introduces a powerful new voice, that of Julia, whose angry genius is thrilling.

I was rather apathetic when starting this book due to my lackluster response for the first book, but I was glad I gave the trilogy a second chance. While there were still several issues that I had with the book and now believe it was due just Grossman’s style and choices that I have problems with as opposed to anything else, this sophomore addition to the trilogy was a much stronger read than its introduction.

First of all, there were two storylines in this installment. One followed Quentin and the gang’s adventures in Fillory as well as a quest to help save magic, while the other explained Julia’s backstory as to how she obtained her magical powers and her own brand of devotion to all magic. The wonderful thing about this book is that you could read it and appreciate the separate storylines as different story arcs for two characters or read it as one cohesive story.

Speaking of Julia’s backstory, I found her to be the much more interesting character overall. While she shared many characteristics that Quentin exhibited in the first book—which led me to believe that Grossman just prefered his protagonists cynical and downright trodden by life—she actually had good reason to behave in that manner. She was also the much more dedicated character, willing to do anything to get a glimpse into the world of magic that was denied to her in the conventional sense. Following Julia really made me appreciate her as a character since now I understand her strange choices, and I admire her for her dedication to devote herself so wholly to something that she absolutely believed in. It was that spirit that made me feel like that she was a character that deserved growth and development because she had put so much energy and effort to obtain it.

I also found Julia’s backstory easier to follow in terms of world-building. Maybe because as a reader I was already introduced to the various elements of Fillory and Billbrakes in book 1, but I found through reading Julia’s chapters that I had a better grasp on what types of magic exist in the worlds as well as highlighting the differences between Fillory and Earth. Also Grossman introduced only one or two parts of Fillory as opposed multiple random details of the magical land; consequently I could visualize FIllory and come to understand why it was such a desirable place for many young magicians.

While the first book was all about discovery and laid the foundation for Fillory, this book was essentially one epic quest for all the characters. I appreciated this as it was easier to grasp the overall plot of the book; while I was never quite sure where the fast-paced story would go after its many turns along the way, at least I understand the journey that I was on. This was a vast improvement from the first book where random events just occurred and no explanations were given or plot points were tied together cohesively until the very last pages. The plot itself was much more action-packed here, with plenty of world-hopping that served a purpose: to try to prevent the end of magic.

Speaking of last pages though, my favourite would have to be that ending—it was both powerful and bittersweet. While magic was an exciting thing to have, magic was not the end-all solution to everything and even magic had to obey some greater law out in the universe. There was really a sense of consequence that occurs even with magic, and I think it tied in nicely with the character development that Quentin experienced throughout the books. While he was still a whiny disdainful brat most of the time, at least he was trying to move past that attitude (or marginally improve it so he was only a whiny brat) through this epic quest, allowing him to become more of a redeemable character that I was interested in rooting for.

The themes that Grossman chose to explore were interesting if not clichéd—the idea of what hero really is and how happily ever afters don’t always stack up to one’s imagination. He did not add anything new to the discussion but I think he did solidly try to develop and demonstrate these two themes throughout the book and it became very apparent by the time one reached the last pages.

There are still issues that I have with the book though; Grossman still adds new characters and does not bother developing anyone from the previous one. I don’t think I have learned anything more about Josh or Eliot or Janet, and they are major supporting characters from both books. Plus I think that Grossman thinks that to make the book seem more mature he has to add a lot of unnecessary crude or inappropriate language. There are multiple instances particularly in the latter half of the book where people just could not stop swearing and I was rolling my eyes; instead of sounding cool or mature or tough or whatever effect Grossman was aiming for, the characters just sound like they had a limited vocabulary range.

Still, this was a good bridge and a much worthy contender than the first book. I look forward to finishing the last book in the trilogy.

Review – The Magicians

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Summary: Like everyone else, precocious high school senior Quentin Coldwater assumes that magic isn’t real, until he finds himself admitted to a very secretive and exclusive college of magic in upstate New York. There he indulges in joys of college-friendship, love, sex, and booze- and receives a rigorous education in modern sorcery. But magic doesn’t bring the happiness and adventure Quentin thought it would. After graduation, he and his friends stumble upon a secret that sets them on a remarkable journey that may just fulfill Quentin’s yearning. But their journey turns out to be darker and more dangerous than they’d imagined.

I was completely and utterly intrigued by the whole tagline “Harry-Potter-but-in-college”; however, it is inaccurate but I was still interested because it combined college and magic, two elements that I would want to read about. So I dived into the book without expecting it to be anything like Harry Potter, and well, my (almost non-existent) expectations still did not match up to what this reading experience turned out to be.

I went in expecting that it will NOT be atmospheric or that all the characters are memorable as the ones in Harry Potter or that the world will be as rich as Hogwarts (because let’s face it, even reality pales in comparison). Instead, my notion of what The Magician would be like is a bunch of teenagers/barely adults trying to grapple with magic during their years in college and all the shenanigans that come with it.

For better or for worse, I was totally wrong.

First of all, it was true that I didn’t see the semblance between this series and Harry Potter (I swear it’ll be the last time that I reference it), but I was also slightly underwhelmed by the world-building and how the magic system works. It was an interesting novel since there are almost two stories involved, and it uses devices like childhood books or classics and a story-within-a-story device.  Unfortunately the whole beloved story-within-a-story series—known as the Fillory books which was oddly reminiscent of Chronicles of Narnia—and how the actual magical system operates in The Magicians series was never explained. Instead, the system and the magical realm expanded only when the plot required it. On one hand, this created suspense and allowed the reader to be more immersed with the experience as the reader learns alongside Quentin—the protagonist and narrator—about the intricacies in the world, but as a non-fantasy reader, I had trouble digesting all the information and understanding how the magical world works for Quentin and the gang. I think for someone who is familiar with the fantasy genre, they will probably have a better time understanding how the spells or the magic system works that is really necessary to bring the world alive.

Also, it is hard to be sympathetic towards Quentin. In the first five chapters, I already became quite annoyed with him because of his attitude problems—he was rude to almost everyone around him, obsessed with his friend’s girlfriend/female best friend probably just because the girl wasn’t interested in dating him (my very humble opinion here), he disliked already someone in his class because their magical ability was greater than his, and on top of that he constantly was condescending to those who he felt were not up to his level. So basically he is an elitist and likes to remind himself constantly that he is worthy because of his intelligence—without actually ever really proving it. Then I realized that in order for me to get through the rest of the book, I would just to have to read it as if the author purposely chose an unsympathetic narrator/protagonist—I’ve yet to find out why yet, other than it added a “cool” or “mature” factor to explore Quentin’s mostly obvious emotional problems aside from everything else that is going on.

Finally the biggest shock for me was that this story’s focus was not on magical college students, well, in college. The years zoom by very quickly, and it actually went beyond what the cast of characters do after their graduation—again, something that I did not anticipate at all. This also meant that everything was very fast paced. It was great because something was always happening and many of those events also come with plenty of action; it would be great for someone who can imagine what is happening as they are reading as it probably unfolds like a mini-series inside their head. However, it also meant that many of these events seem very condensed and they wrap up in a chapter or two before the novel continued to race along to the next plot point and set of excitement. To be honest, because of the unexpected timeline I felt the overall plot was rather scattered until the very last pages where some explanations were offered. I wished the book was longer so that Grossman could devote more pages developing the plot and to make it more cohesive, since I literally could not make the connection between all the random plot points until the last thirty pages. I did like the whole “twist” that Grossman had at the end to tie everything together and personally did not see it coming, but I felt like it was too little too late in terms of unifying the plot or trying to create any deeper emotions than just a quest for teenagers who were bored. To be honest, I feel like this book is pretty self-contained in the sense that while the ending may not be perfect, it wraps up most points for me. I am uncertain how it’ll pan out for the next two books in the trilogy.

Probably what I enjoyed the most was the large cast of characters in The Magicians. Aside from Quentin, there were many other characters that walked in and out of the plot (quite literally) throughout the book. Some of them were pretty endearing, if not exactly completely likeable or properly developed again. There was the cool-yet-mysterious boy, the comic relief, the smart-and-quiet girl, the outgoing-queen-bee girl, and plenty more. While they were essentially stereotypes, it was interesting to see how the stereotypes grapple with magic and how they used it for better or for worse.

The biggest takeaway from this story though, is that I am definitely intrigued by the mini-series now. If all 13 episodes are only adapted from this book, it should be an interesting show since it will allow the plot and the characters to breathe more properly as opposed to cramming everything in 402 pages. I think it will offer an advantage for world-building since Grossman is pretty sparse with his words when it comes to demonstrating how magic works. I am still debating if I will continue with the series (but I most likely will).