The Magicians by Lev Grossman

In Brooklyn reality had been empty and meaningless - whatever inferior stuff it was made of, meaning had refused to adhere to it. Brakebills was different. It mattered. Meaning - is that what magic was? - was everywhere here. The place was crawling with it. Out there he had been on the edge of serious depression, and worse, he had been in danger of learning to really dislike himself. He was on the verge of incurring the kind of inward damage you didn't heal from, ever. But now he felt like Pinocchio, a wooden boy who was made real. Or maybe it was the other way around, he'd been turned from a real boy into something else? Either way the change was for the better.

-The Magicians

I've not read every review of Lev Grossman's The Magicians, but I think you'd be hard-pressed to find one that doesn't refer to Harry Potter and The Chronicles of Narnia. The Magicians, a coming-of-age story featuring the moody Quentin Coldwater, draws heavily from both sources. Like Harry, Quentin is plucked from his ordinary life and sent to a school for magic - though Quentin, who was set to interview for Princeton, is significantly older. And what is our hero obsessed with? The fictional land of Fillory, as detailed in the series Fillory and Further, which chronicles the adventures of the Chatwin children. The oldest Chatwin, Martin, discovers a portal to Fillory in a grandfather clock. I think it's pretty clear that Grossman isn't trying hard to hide his influences.

But the story of Quentin Coldwater is very different. For one, it's absolutely not a children's story. It's really not even a fantasy, primarily. Or it's the most realistic fantasy ever. Grossman's magic is very much grounded in the real world, and a lot of that probably has to do with Quentin himself. Upon arriving at the magical school of Brakebills, Quentin discovers learning spells is tedious work. He's surrounded by competitive overachievers like himself, and it takes him a long time to make friends. Unlike Harry Potter, Quentin never really delights in magic. There's none of that euphoric sense of wonder that in Rowling's universe can be found in everything from Chocolate Frogs to Quidditch. Despite the passage I quoted above, Quentin is often desperately unhappy.

Wasn't there a spell for making yourself happy? Somebody must have invented one. How could he have missed it? Why didn't they teach it?

And then he graduates. Imagine the world of Harry Potter if there had been no Voldemort. Sounds idyllic, perhaps, but magic often requires epic, good-versus-evil confrontation. In Quentin's world there are too many magicians and not enough monsters. Quentin encountered one, known only as the Beast*, during a classroom spell gone awry. But after Brakebills, cushioned by a private fund set aside for young magicians, Quentin is aimless. He joins some other Brakebills alums in New York City, then spends his nights spiraling out of control and his days recovering. His unhappiness, never long absent, begins to engulf him.

The world shifts again. Quentin gets proof that, against all odds, Fillory is real. Surely, this will be it: the one thing that can really make him happy. But Fillory, it turns out, is nothing like Quentin imagined.

Quentin is a difficult character. I often found him unsympathetic, but I also found him to be quite realistic in his reactions to the world around him. And one afternoon, feeling grumpy after a long day at work, I pulled out The Magicians and sympathized with Quentin immensely. So perhaps it just depends on your mood. It's really not a happy novel, though. Well-realized? Yes. Clever? Absolutely. Happy? Not in the slightest. Bear that in mind.

I realize I haven't touched at all on the other characters in the novel. I thought Grossman assembled an interesting bunch, particularly brainy, quiet Alice and arch, oft-drunken Eliot. I sometimes wondered how the story might have played from their perspectives.

I am someone who, after disliking Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on first read, rediscovered it after loving the film adaptation; I then complained when the follow-up film wasn't dark enough to suit me**. In other words, after a rough transition to Rowling's darker world, I preferred it that way, and found the early gee-whiz aspect a bit childish. (No real complaint, though, they are children's books, and I love them.) I thought I would love a darker, more adult twist on Potter. Instead, though I did like The Magicians, I gained a new appreciation of Rowling's sense of whimsy. Interesting book, in the end, and certainly one that left me thinking afterward.

Up next: So excited to have Nemesis, Jo Nesbø's follow-up to The Redbreast!

*It's worth noting that The Beast is insanely terrifying and one of the best aspects of the book. Scary stuff.

**See, I'm a sucker for muddying the Potter world up a bit. Like this video, which is a montage of clips from the films set to "The Funeral" by Band of Horses. Oh so nerdy, and I love it - especially when the drums kick in and it all goes to hell.