The Magicians Comments
The Magicians (Lev Grossman)
Description (Amazon)
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. Psychologically piercing and dazzlingly inventive, The Magicians is an enthralling coming-of-age tale about magic practiced in the real world-where good and evil aren't black and white, and power comes at a terrible price.
The Magicians is a book that will take you by surprise. In a genre populated by epic fantasy quests and magical swords, by overused cliches and shallow fantasy, this book is really something unique; it’s grown-up fantasy. This is part Harry Potter on downers and suffering from clinical depression, part Alice trapped in a Wonderland gone nightmarishly wrong. At it's heart, the Magicians is really the story of a boy-become-man struggling to give the world meaning in a world that has no meaning. What does this all mean? The Magicians is fantasy that’s more than fantasy. If you are looking for a happy-go-lucky read where the world is saved and everyone finds true love and does a victory dance into the sunset, you may want to skip this one. For the rest of you who want to taste something different (and this one has a lot of zing to it folks), Lev Grossman’s The Magicians delivers. Apparently, Lev Grossman is working on a sequel to The Magicians. I wait with bated breath.
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I read this book to the end. Really well written book (in the sense of narrative capabilities) and that's what made me go to the end, cause I fell really excited in the first 50 pages, when I believed that beyond the cliche world the author created, there will be lots of mind ground breaking and turnarounds in this book. I got so frustrated when nothing important nor great happened. I got really upset for the "adultness" put into the book. I though it would be violent, intense, philosophical, deep... But it was just a bunch of dirty words in the dialogs, some sex and drugs, what is really far from being adult, except for the rating and parental advisory. It's shallow and not innovative. I really like fantasy and I just didn't read a lot of books duebecause I don't have much time. From the few fantasy books I read, and other fantasy midia, I can say almost everything I saw in this book could be found somewhere else. The river dragon from Spirited Away, the time lapse in the "school world" just like in Mists of Avalon, the Fillory - Narnia, the Harry Potter College... Seriously? This book? A best seller and hated 31 in this top. I just can't agree.
This book is very far from the waste of time some commenters have indicated. There are several layers to this novel, and I think depending which layers resonate with you, you will either come away feeling like the book is brilliant or treacherous. Some parts are hilarious and some parts are cloaked in a numbness that will sadly turn some people off. I come down on the side arguing for it being brilliant. The book is in no way a "rip off". One of its central ideas is to engage (sometimes critically) with the fantasy genre, and so it makes dozens of references to other works all over the place. It's just what it does, and it does it out in the open. It also engages with how the fantasy genre influences its readers, and this can be painful at times, but at its heart this book is about realistic people with hopes and desires that, as is all too often case in life, can never be satisfied. The main character does not fit any ordinary definition of "likable", but his flaws are human. Lev Grossman, in addition to being an author, is also a book critic and tech writer for Time magazine, and I believe his critical sensibility shows up in the book. I think this makes the whole thing richer, because of how self-aware it is. Some will not like this. I loved it. And, all of that subtextual stuff notwithstanding, the writing is exceptionally fresh and simply top notch. Depending on how the rest of series turns out (there is a sequel, and likely further installments beyond that) this work may deserve to return to a higher place on this list.
Also, an interesting anecdote I heard during an interview with Mr. Grossman: he was originally working on this novel with the idea of a contemporary school for magicians around 1996. Then Harry Potter came out. He shoved his manuscript aside in frustration and didn't return to the project for a decade.
The sequel 'Magician King' is considerably better, primarily because of Julia's story. The characters grow up a bit and act a bit less like dicks. It has a more interesting , developed, and more epic plotline than before.
No!!! This should be in your 'WORST fantasy books ever' page. This book makes no sense at all. 'Coming-of-age'? Wildly inaccurate. The characters enter an American Hogwarts and come out bigger douche bags than they went in. Happening across a portal to the magical world of Fillory they also meet a talking bear. The rubbish plot continues until Quentin ends up back in the human world and you end up wondering why you wasted money and time reading The Magicians.
read this because,after reading most of the other books on this list felt like they had done a good pionting me towards good books, so i gave it chance. skip this one, personally i found nothing enjoyable about reading this book. to explain why its bad would take up more time than im willing to spend writing this, but this was the first book in many years that ive bought and became so annoyed with I couldn't finish.
I think the top 10 on your list was pretty good, although maybe ordered differently to how I would do it.
This novel appearing on your list destroys the list for me... Mistborn above Wheel of Time was questionable, but Magicians was absolutely terrible. So bland and such a blatant rip off...
I have read a bunch of fantasy novels.
None of them have been as bad as this book.
If you wish that your life contained 1-dimensional characters, a linear plot, and story elements that are clumsily introduced then dropped and without explanation, you probably have to read this book.
In addition I should also recommend the excellent novel "Soon I Will be Invincible", written by Lev Grossman's twin brother Austin.
This book is crammed with miserable and unsympathetic characters that I feel robbed me of the enjoyment of the interesting world of magic they populate. Read the recommended "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, instead- a far, far superior book.
the author's name is lev grossman, not less grossman
I have read a bunch of fantasy novels.
None of them have been as good as this book.
If you wish that your life contained something more, just a bit more, you probably have to read this book.