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The Magicians (The Magicians #1)

by Lev Grossman (Goodreads Author)

3.41 · rating details · 22,848 ratings · 4,889 reviews

Quentin Coldwater is brillant but miserable. He's a senior in high school, and a certifiable genius, but he's still secretly obsessed with a series of fantasy novels he read as a kid, about the adventures of five children in a magical land called Fillory. Compared to that, anything in his real life just seems gray and colorless.

Everything changes when Quentin ...more

Hardcover, 402 pages

Published August 11th 2009 by Viking (first published January 1st 2009)

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Community Reviews

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Dec 12, 2011

Mike (the Paladin) rated it

Shelves: fantasy, urban-fantasy

I have a Goordreads friend who likes this book. He expressed a thought that I might not. While not wholly correct about my take he came pretty close.:

Well, first Stephen, you're right in a way, I don't like stories that are "downers just to be downers". The nihilistic attitude you see so often. I don't like the (as I've said before) "life is crap and then you die" story. So many today seem to think that for a story to have any depth it has to be deeply depressing...more

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Aug 02, 2011

Kemper rated it

Shelves: fantasy, magic, 2011-r

A quick and easy way to describe this would be to call it Harry Potter for adults. There's a magic school and a lot more sex and booze than poor old Harry ever had. But that doesn't do it justice because this was an extremely original and unique twist on the notion of what it would be like to actually live in a world where magic and fantasy realms exist.

Quentin Coldwater is a bored teenager getting ready to apply for college but is already seriously disillusioned with his life and w...moreA quick and easy way to describe this would be to call it Harry Potter for adults. There's a magic school and a lot more sex and booze than poor old Harry ever had. But that doesn't do it justice because this was an extremely original and unique twist on the notion of what it would be like to actually live in a world where magic and fantasy realms exist.

Quentin Coldwater is a bored teenager getting ready to apply for college but is already seriously disillusioned with his life and wishes things were more like his favorite fantasy novels set in a land called Fillory, which is essentially the author's stand-in for Narnia. However, Quentin quickly learns that he's got magical talent, and he's suddenly attending a training academy called Brakebills.

Quentin is the kind of guy who after finding out he won a huge lottery would instantly start bitching about how bad the taxes will be. Even though he's always longed for a world closer to his Filory novels, he never sees the adventure he's living by learning magic and all the things that go into his training. Learning magic and even falling in love don't make him happy, and he holds onto the childish idea that there's some 'next place' that will finally make him complete.

To make matters worse, once he and his friends graduate, they learn that there's no real need for magic since there are no big magical threats so they use their talents to live fat and easy while partying too much and trying to entertain themselves. Until an old classmate appears with the news that Filory is real.

There's three big things at work in this book. The idea that magic is real, and the author put a great deal of effort into developing the idea of magic in the real world with specific rules. The second is that the idea of journeying to a magical land on some kind of quest would be a fun adventure is actually pretty naive when you consider how actually bloody and insane the kind of things described would be. (Think about what it would REALLY be like to have some kind of half-human/half-beast run at you with a sword.) The third (and most interesting) is that a young man with a world of possibilities in front of him would find himself disappointed with life because it isn't like an adventure story and his stubborn refusal to realize that life will never be like a fantasy novel even if he eventually makes it to an actual fantasy world.

Fast-paced, funny, sometimes tragic and always entertaining, this was a book that I really enjoyed for it's offbeat way of looking at magic and fantasy stories.(less)

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Feb 08, 2011

Dan rated it

Shelves: fantasy, plan-on-rereading-one-day, favorites

Quentin Coldwater is an unhappy teen, eyeing up an uncertain future in college. He's secretly in love with his friend Julia. Nothing else really matters to him except the Fillory and Further series of books he's loved since childhood. Imagine how he feels when a seamingly routine college interview drops an undiscovered Fillory book in his grasp and leads him to Brakebills, a college of wizardry, and worlds beyond...

First of all, this isn't Harry Potter for adults, no matter how mu...more

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Oct 26, 2011

Emilie rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: 11, mythic-fiction, ya

emi: mr. grossman, i am here representing the commonwealth of language and literature. i regret to inform you that i am revoking your simile license.

grossman:but. but, that is like ...

emi:don't do it, sir. one more simile and i can have you arrested. you have shown a gross negligence.

grossman:well, who are you to talk?! you abuse the common comma!

emi:i do admit to an indulgence with the comma, but i am not charging people to read my writing. if i ...moreemi: mr. grossman, i am here representing the commonwealth of language and literature. i regret to inform you that i am revoking your simile license.

grossman:but. but, that is like ...

emi:don't do it, sir. one more simile and i can have you arrested. you have shown a gross negligence.

grossman:well, who are you to talk?! you abuse the common comma!

emi:i do admit to an indulgence with the comma, but i am not charging people to read my writing. if i were to publish a novel, i'd work with someone called an editor.

grossman:you can't do this to me! i am...this is like--

emi /walks away/

i don't remember the last time i read a book that i hated so much. this is less than one star material and i wish i wasn't so compulsive that i feel that i have to finish every book i start. it's the most poorly written, sexist, ethnocentric, cliche ridden, fake thing i can remember reading.

this makes me so mad it's making me sarcastic. i hate quentin. the author is not as smart as he thinks he is and neither is quentin. everything is spelled out and repeated, the constant attitude :look at me!!!look at me! i'm so clever, do you see what i'm doing here? i'm talking about the story as i tell it!? oh, i am so brilliant. did you notice i just made a reference to all these fantasy novels you read and several cool bands, and now i'm making a reference to the storytelling process itself, oh, i am so cool and so smart woo! ...

stop telling me that he is the smartest of the smart! i dislike when people keep telling me something that isn't true. he lacks common sense, insight, logic, and the ability to think critically. he's heartless and unkind. he is also the the most entitled, privileged,nothing to say except he is bored. bored? really? and then it's like here's this alternate world and quentin and his friends go in because they are bored and want an adventure which is to save these people...and they can't save themselves because they are too stupid because they need american children to save them. really? because what world could possibly make things right without americans, right?

reading this makes me hate reading. now that's a special kind of talent, isn't it?

the one good thing: reading this has made me reflect on how in the last year or so, in my search for comfort reading combined with my wish to wait to read the really good books when i am done with the [ ](which is still 6 months away) i have let myself stop looking for the kind of books that really move me. (not completely, but a lot.) so, i am inspired to stop waiting. thank you for that!(less)

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Jun 25, 2011

Stefan rated it

Shelves: fantasy, library-loan, www-fantasyliterature-com-review

The Magicians by Lev Grossman is one of the most frequently reviewed fantasy novels of the last few years, which isn’t surprising because the author is a well known writer (and book reviewer) for TIME Magazine, and the book was very effectively hyped as “Harry Potter with college age students.” The end result of all of this is that lots of people who don’t regularly read fantasy have picked up this novel, and many of them had their expectations severely challenged. So, is The Magicians also wort...more

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Nov 09, 2009

Kasia rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: high-fantasy, lovely-covers

I was ready to love this book, it's supposed to be Harry Potter like but more gritty, more realistic, more substantial, and I guess it is and I still like the idea of it. And yet this book did not work for me. I was really patient with it, I downplayed the initial irritation of incorporating the entire Potter premise. It's one thing to borrow bits and pieces, it's another to rip off a whole concept leaving out a few bits here and there and dressing up the rest. But since I'm a sucker for fantasy...more

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Jun 16, 2011

Chris rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: beyond-reality

What a strange little book. Not sure what else to call it, unless it would be a blending of Harry Potter and Narnia with adult content and a heavy dash of the bleak yet often humorous mind-set of a Chuck Palahniuk novel.

And yet, I very much enjoyed it. It wasn't epic, nor heroic. It didn't really have a constructive social message. It wasn't very positive at all. But I still liked it quite a bit.

What does that say about me? Am I negative, with little hope of finding happi...more

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Feb 26, 2010

D. rated it

Shelves: fantasy-sf-horror

This book has been hard-pedaled as an adult Harry Potter and it is-but with a soulless little git like Draco Malfoy as the main protagonist. Grossman doesn't get to the genuine transformative joy possible in books about other worlds and magic, the metaphorical kick one can bring to the reader. This is a cold and sterile book for people who think themselves too sophisticated for genre fiction, a sub-section of the reading public that, I suspect, includes the author.

To be fair there a...moreThis book has been hard-pedaled as an adult Harry Potter and it is-but with a soulless little git like Draco Malfoy as the main protagonist. Grossman doesn't get to the genuine transformative joy possible in books about other worlds and magic, the metaphorical kick one can bring to the reader. This is a cold and sterile book for people who think themselves too sophisticated for genre fiction, a sub-section of the reading public that, I suspect, includes the author.

To be fair there are certain things Grossman does well. There are isolated set-pieces of violence and magical ritual gone wrong, that are thrilling, scary and visceral. He also is very clever at conveying the huge rush of empowerment a disenfranchised teen would feel when uncovering then honing magical powers. The old riff of a nobody becoming somebody is done well here, even though it’s crouched in dry, clinical and mechanistic terms that undermine its effectiveness.

And that’s the rub here. For every scene of terror and beauty, there are two that are clumsy and lame. Grossman presents certain key plot elements so obtusely that they hit like a feather instead of a hammer. He condenses action at the wrong times, has pivotal stuff occur off-stage as it were and just doesn’t deliver from page to page either on the commercial fiction scale or one grander.

Traditional Fantasy Novels power(as well as their stodgy childishness) lie to a degree in their pedagogical function. They are to an extent primers for young people on how to behave, how to become a more effective human being, how to be brave in the face of adversity and to learn to be selfless on occasion even though ones adolescent genes(and jeans) are screaming for pure selfish, solipsistic, I am the center of the universe, expression.

So there is a journey up Mount Doom by sad, wounded Frodo and stout, brave Sam. And Harry Potter puts his nuts on the line over and over against that nose-less wonder, Voldemort, secure in the knowledge that Ron and Hermione always have his back. They are, in the course of their journeys, becoming braver and stronger and less rooted in their myopic view of things. In Grossman’s novel, the protagonist starts out as a selfish turd, segue ways to more selfish turdism, and then does a sideways double back flip into being (you guessed it) a selfish turd. This is refreshing to an extent-how like real life it is-people seldom change unless confronted by trauma or some extreme events. But in Grossman’s hands it is just one more nail in the coffin, taking an eminently worthwhile premise(adult Harry Potter, twisted Narnia) and magically transforming it through bad craft into utter shit.
(less)

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Apr 18, 2009

Mike rated it

The logline zipping about for this novel almost convinced me to give it a pass, despite having enjoyed Grossman's last novel: Harry Potter leaves me cold; I'm seemingly the only person in the world who liked (the underrated) The Little Friend a whole lot more than (the overrated) The Secret History; the Narnia books--the three I read, resentfully--were forced on me by parents who thought they would appeal to me in a manner more wholesome than the horror fiction consumed by (or consuming) me star...moreThe logline zipping about for this novel almost convinced me to give it a pass, despite having enjoyed Grossman's last novel: Harry Potter leaves me cold; I'm seemingly the only person in the world who liked (the underrated) The Little Friend a whole lot more than (the overrated) The Secret History; the Narnia books--the three I read, resentfully--were forced on me by parents who thought they would appeal to me in a manner more wholesome than the horror fiction consumed by (or consuming) me starting in grade 4, and there's nothing I liked less than escapism meant to be good for me. And that touchstone Tolkien? Meh. Fantasy's just generally not my bag of fantasy; creatures, crimes, heists, aliens, even the most ludicrous of space operas, sure, ... but orcs and swords and spells and magic, all that thirteen-sided die stuff, will usually bore when not actively aggravating me.

But The Magicians was line by line clear then lush then sly and always engaging, chapter by chapter engrossing, and ultimately a very good read, even for the magic-resistant, and despite a few tics and tacks that rankled here and there.

There was one sequence that knocked my socks off. I won't give much away, for fear of spoilers, but it channeled the most chilling possibilities hinted at by Lovecraft, and captured what throughout the novel worked best for me: magic (and fantasy more broadly) as an alien, inscrutable force, not just some pallid escapist complement to our real-world desires but that deep unconscious confusing Other stuff which pushes up and surprises, unsettles, confuses our sense of the world and our place in it. At its best, and the chapter on "The Beast" is pretty damn wonderful, the novel made me understand the allure of Fantasy. It made me want to read the way our protagonist Quentin reads the Narnia-inflected Fillory novels, the way Grossman must read his favorites.

And the book was never less than good.

Even with those aforementioned tics. I can find novels about youth on that road to disillusionment--even when the plot's more concerned with incantations than intoxication ('though this novel has a fair bit of both)--a wee bit dull. If I'm gonna read about self-obsessed men (who are more like boys), I'd rather they were even more outrageously awful--more John-Selfish, fewer epiphanies, no hint of redemption. (I like my bad behavior neat, no chaser.) The magical element maybe didn't sidetrack me enough from the somewhat too-familiar misspent-youth plot, nor vice versa. But, again, I'm pretty much the exact opposite of the person who might be very inclined to pick this up--and I *still* really dug it. So I'm betting the countless, respective and/or collective Potter Tartt Lewis fans will do handsprings about the novel, and deservedly so. Good stuff.(less)

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Sep 30, 2009

Sarah rated it

Shelves: alex-award

I had such high hopes for this "next Harry Potter" novel and was singing its praises early on in my reading. The first half of the novel is very much like an adult Harry Potter book. Quentin is applying for colleges and doesn't know what he wants out of life. Then he gets a magical invitation to take a difficult test in a room full of smart kids. He makes it and sets off to Brakebills College. There he learns magic, meets friends, and realizes that he still isn't a very happy person. L...more

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Mar 19, 2011

Stephen rated it

Shelves: ebooks, audiobook, darker-than-you-think, fantasy, magic-schools, dark-and-gritty, magical-realism

5.0 stars. I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK!!!! I know that not everyone agrees with this sentiment for this book, but I was greatly impressed by it. From the very beginning of this story, I got the distinct feeling that Grossman was going to be taking "the less travelled path" in his fantasy novel. While I have seen a lot of comparisons to other stories (some of which are quite intentional by the author) this book is certainly ITS OWN BOOK.

The novel is really two very differ...more5.0 stars. I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK!!!! I know that not everyone agrees with this sentiment for this book, but I was greatly impressed by it. From the very beginning of this story, I got the distinct feeling that Grossman was going to be taking "the less travelled path" in his fantasy novel. While I have seen a lot of comparisons to other stories (some of which are quite intentional by the author) this book is certainly ITS OWN BOOK.

The novel is really two very different and distinct stories that I thought worked together very well. The first half to two-thirds of the book is the story of Quentin Coldwater, a brilliant, angst-ridden, self-involved high school senior. Or, put another way, a pretty normal teenager that happens to be intellectually gifted. While Quentin is on his way to be interviewed for acceptance at Princeton, he is (through a series of circumstances I won't spoil) given the opportunity to enroll in a secret university that teaches magic. You can tell from that description how the Harry Potter comparisons come up. However, this "magic" school and the students that attend there are portrayed (quite effectively in my opinion) as the kind of personalities you would expect to find at a college campus for gifted teenagers. Common threads running through the group based on some shared intellectual capabilities, but otherwise a very eclectic group from a variety of backgrounds and all dealing with their own very real issues. In addition, the teaching of magic is shown to be a extremely difficult and an often tedious endeavor. I thought this aspect of the book was superbly done and made for compelling reading.

One other interesting (to me at least) aspect of Quentin that I think bears mentioning is that he is a HUGE FANTASY FANBOY and so the discovery that magic is real makes him believe that all of his dreams are going to come true and that he is going to be able to live out the dream of being a part of a real life fantasy adventure. I can imagine their are a number of us that could relate to that. However, reality, even one with magic, is never as easy or as fun as Quentin's books make them out and so he finds himself disappointed and disillusioned a lot. In fact, his extensive knowledge of other fantasy worlds actually makes the disappointment more acute.

Frankly, I don't see how it could be any other way and that this relationship to fiction and reality is one of the central themes that Grossman was exploring in this novel. Thus, I found one of the book's central messages to be that part of growing up is reconciling your childhood dreams with the realities of everyday life, AND STILL FINDING A WAY TO BE HAPPY!!! Some people found this to be a sad or depressing message, but I didn't find it that way at all. I think we all see the world differently now then we did when we were kids and that doesn't mean we are less happy.

Anyway, Quentin's favorite fantasy series is about a land called Fillory which very intentionally resembles Narnia complete with siblings going through furniture to a strange land ruled by giant, god-like animals (a Ram named Ember rather than a lion named Aslan). This is important because Fillory plays a central role in the last part of the novel which I will not go into so as to avoid spoilers. I will just say that the last third of the novel becomes a fairly typical fantasy adventure in structure, but whose execution is in keeping with the tone and style of the rest of the story. In other words, Fillory is NOT YOUR PARENTS NARNIA. As with the first two thirds of the book, I found this to be well written and compelling.

Overall, I can not recommend this book highly enough. I thought the writing was superb, the characters were three dimensional and very well developed and the world-building was amazing, especially in regards to how the fantastic was made to seem so real. HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!!(less)

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Sep 03, 2009

Cindy rated it

Shelves: fantasy

Okay I am in the minority I didn't really like this book. I didn't think it was going to be a Harry Potter, as a matter of fact I knew it wouldn't be even though it was compared to HP.... the author even compared it to HP which its not.

I can enjoy that this is a "tribute" to fantasy..... but that's about it. It was a depressing poorly written book. Details seemed to be lacking and the only details we'd get is a knock off version of another fantasy book. The characters were...more

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Aug 19, 2010

Seth Hahne rated it

People love describing one thing as the adult version of another thing. For example, Foucault's Pendulum is like The Da Vinci Code for adults. The allure of this kind of comparison is at least threefold: 1) it offers a simple way to draw people in, by playing on their affection for another work; 2) it leverages against the desire to take in a more mature version of something they already like; and 3) it derides the value of the other, presumably-enjoyed work.

People love to dismiss e...more

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Feb 19, 2010

Ben Babcock rated it

Shelves: 2010-read, fantasy, owned

If you write enough book reviews, eventually you start sounding like everyone you never wanted to be. Today, I'll be the annoying guy who brags about how he saw everything coming. That's right, I found this book utterly predictable from start to finish. Even the Arctic fox sex scene.

The Magicians is a very postmodern type of fantasy, deconstructing as it does the Narnian-style childhood fantasy of saving the world. It's one of those curiously self-aware books that nevertheless st...more

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Jul 27, 2011

Ian rated it

Shelves: urban-fantasy, philosophy, magic, fantasy, dark-fantasy

A friend gave this book to me as a Christmas present, but the sneering reviews (on and inside the book) which compared it (oh-so-favorably) to Harry Potter/Narnia/LotR (proclaiming them "weak" and this strong and bracing and refreshing and...) kept repulsing me before I could even get to the first page. She's coming to visit me next month however and I'm determined to read it! Updates to follow!

UPDATE 4: A miserable book about miserable people being miserable while do...moreA friend gave this book to me as a Christmas present, but the sneering reviews (on and inside the book) which compared it (oh-so-favorably) to Harry Potter/Narnia/LotR (proclaiming them "weak" and this strong and bracing and refreshing and...) kept repulsing me before I could even get to the first page. She's coming to visit me next month however and I'm determined to read it! Updates to follow!

UPDATE 4: A miserable book about miserable people being miserable while doing miserable things written by, I suspect, a very miserable man. I was also disappointed, but amused, to learn how much of the novel (especially the identity of the "big bad" and the fate of an oft-mentioned ancillary character) I was able to predict ahead of time, and the dialogue in the final great confrontation felt absurdly hackneyed -- especially coming from an author desperately trying to establish a narrative and style contrary to the genre he's trying to satirize/criticize/mock. You know whose story would have been far more interesting and engaging and subversive? MARTIN CHATWIN. You know whose story was a tiresome exercise in sneering banality? QUENTIN COLDWATER.

UPDATE 3: This is a quick, easy read -- i think that has a lot to do with Grossman's "tell-don't-show" approach to writing, and the psuedo-serialized format. The characters are pretty flat, just broad generalizations (fat guy, uptight girl, mopey protagonist, smart love-interest, mohawk guy, Russian teacher, hot young teacher, etc.) and the dialog actually feels LESS realistic and MORE awkward for all the modern-day slang and profanity that's shoehorned in. The sex scenes are vague descriptions, and for that I have to admire Grossman's restraint -- after all, he's trying very hard to write for "adults".

UPDATE 2: I think I've finally realized what this actually reminds me of. It's like a pale imitation of the graphic novel "The Book of Magic" by Neil Gaiman (and its subsequent, lesser follow-up serieses "The Books of Magic", "The Names of Magic" and "The Age of Magic".) It seems to draw a lot from "The Books of Magic" actually, complete with an immature (emotionally, psychologically, intellectually and physically) wizard slowly using his power to indulge his every base instinct and whim and losing touch with humanity. Sadly, there's no great sense of loss here, only a slow realization that the protagonist is as tiresome at the end as he was at the beginning.

UPDATE 1: I found this line from a GoodReads review of the book and it seems to sum up what I'm feeling and what most non-hipsters felt about it: "This is a cold and sterile book for people who think themselves too sophisticated for genre fiction, a sub-section of the reading public that, I suspect, includes the author." Grossman is a "teller" not a "shower" and as a result he's really not much of a writer. The only parts I've actually found compelling have been the brief descriptions of the natural world in Upstate New York, and that's only because I grew up there and remember the place quite clearly; I am substituting my memories for the artistry Grossman lacks. So far every character has been unpleasant and unsympathetic, no-one is really happy or even capable of feeling content, and magic is empty and apparently incapable of anything truly special. How very much like every "profound" novel written these days! Maybe this will appeal more to fans of Jonathan Franzen and Michael Chabon? It will certainly appeal to those readers who mistake misery and depression and nihilism for depth and insight and realism. Is the message that magic cannot make you happy, because it is merely a tool and as such simply reflects the inner character of the user? That could have been conveyed without hitting the reader quite so hard over the head with how utterly miserable everyone and everything is. Part of the problem with "The Magicians" is that the author clearly sees the subject matter as far beneath him, like the "Fillory" books which Quentin loves but others dismiss as childish and through which Grossman conveys his utter contempt for Lewis, Tolkien, Rowling, etc. and their fans; it is as though Grossman and his hipster readers are outside looking in and sharing smirking, adolescent jibes directed at the people having genuine fun inside. After all, they're too COOL to join the party. I hope things improve, but it's not much hope.(less)

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Jun 01, 2011

Kevin Xu rated it

Shelves: re-read

I feel like this book has too many tropes and cliche of all the mainstream fantasy books all wrapped up in one book, maybe the sequel will be better. Not worth the time to read it. Here is where I the reason that I really hate the book so much. First, the author comes from this high New York mind set that only New Yorkers have that they are better than others, better yet add both Harvard and Yale into the mix. (reason why the New York Times and the media loved this book) To me what I hate most a...more

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Aug 08, 2010

Jason (FNORDinc) rated it

Shelves: reviewed, reviewed-on-fnordinc

“BURN THIS” wrote Lev Grossman on the inside cover of my book. Lev was surprised to see a copy of his first novel ‘WARP’ showing up a book reading for ‘The Magicians’. He stated that most of the remaining copies are being used to hold up his broken couch at home. A humorous idea and I wonder how many new authors end up with excess copies of their first printings lying about.

Unfortunately, I think I threw him off his game a bit, and feeling bad, I did not stick around to ask him any que...more“BURN THIS” wrote Lev Grossman on the inside cover of my book. Lev was surprised to see a copy of his first novel ‘WARP’ showing up a book reading for ‘The Magicians’. He stated that most of the remaining copies are being used to hold up his broken couch at home. A humorous idea and I wonder how many new authors end up with excess copies of their first printings lying about.

Unfortunately, I think I threw him off his game a bit, and feeling bad, I did not stick around to ask him any questions. Instead, I will ask them psychically, or maybe via email :)

‘The Magicians’ will not end up holding a couch off the hardwood floor of his living room. It was a phenomenal book.

In Magicians, magic exists. Schools for magic exist. Students go to these schools and learn a very large amount of very dull information. There is no evil villain ala Rowlings/HP universe.. Only a life assisted by magic, or a life in a cubicle with the rest of us non-magic schmucks.

Quentin Coldwater lives in one fo the boroughs of NYC. He is a geek, top of his class, not used to brilliance that outshines his own. He is no virgin, but likely this could be due to technicalities. Quentin is focusing on getting into an Ivy League college… Little else matters, including the fact that he has absolutely no idea what to do with his life. He is very easy to relate to, angsty, but relate-able.

This novel is perfect for anyone who loved reading CS Lewis as a child. It is perfect for those who wish HP and friends would grow a backbone and drop an F-bomb when they get angry or forget some homework. Drinking, drugs, praying to the porcelain god, sex, mind numbing classrooms, confused normal humans, even a throwback scene near the end that reminded me of the ridiculousness of the movie ‘The Craft’ (floating windblown witches)… This book has just about everything in it.

It shares just a bit of the same essence as Peter Jackson’s ‘Meet the Feebles’ had for muppets. Just a bit…

The Magicians touches quite boldly on the pulse of the magic community. People may be able to snap their fingers and light a cigarette from a finger tip flame, or accidentally call a black hole into existence, but in the end, self-esteem cannot be given to a person. Though I have to admit a bit of money, success, sex and a lot of luck could set someones self esteem in a spot where growth will be hands off to a certain degree. Ultimately though, it has to come from with in.

-- FNORDinc.com
http://www.fnordinc.com/2010/08-07/revie...(less)

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Jun 01, 2011

Dawn rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, read-in-2010, own-read, read-in-2011

I don't know what I can say about this one that hasn't already been said. Yes, it's true, it is sort of a mash up of Harry Potter and Narnia. But it's so much more than that as well. I really liked this book, though I can't really explain why. It kept me interested the whole time through, which not many books do. It was fun and a little dark as well, and it made me laugh quite often. I had no idea that this was a series, and there was another book coming out next year, until I flipped to the las...more

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Aug 19, 2009

miaaa rated it

Recommends it for: Dahlia Naga, Echa Russell

Recommended to miaaa by: Windy Ariestanty

Shelves: fairy-haven

There's only two options dealing with life and it's problem. You stay and fought your way or you run and hide to a fantasy land. Quentin, or Q as his friends address him, never satisfied with his life. It lacks of something and when he was accepted at Brakehills he thinks this is it. But is it? Would he be happy now that he is amongst fellow Magicians?

Apparently this book or Grossman tried to remind us, we all have magic inside us. It's a matter are we strong enough to use it? To lea...more

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Jan 02, 2012

Emily rated it

Shelves: 2011, fantasy, not-as-good-as-the-hype

After reading this, I felt like a bully had just wrecked my favorite toys. Grossman took the sense of wonder out of Hogwarts and turned it into the tedium of Brakebills. (view spoiler)...more

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Jun 04, 2011

± Colleen of the Crawling Chaos ± rated it

Shelves: dark-fantasy, library-read, group-read

1 1/2

Where to start?

Some people don't see to like this book because it's too bleak and depressing. Not depressing in a truly sad kind of way, more just the depressing of disappointment. Others don't like it because of the drugs, sex, cursing and copious alcoholic consumption. I think that both of these things are definitely there, but that they're realistic in the context of the story we're being told.

However, realism is not quite the same as sympathetic...more1 1/2

Where to start?

Some people don't see to like this book because it's too bleak and depressing. Not depressing in a truly sad kind of way, more just the depressing of disappointment. Others don't like it because of the drugs, sex, cursing and copious alcoholic consumption. I think that both of these things are definitely there, but that they're realistic in the context of the story we're being told.

However, realism is not quite the same as sympathetic - and herein lies my main problem. I just didn't like Quentin. He's completely self-centered, irresponsible, whiney - and he never learns anything.

I sympathized more with him in the beginning - (view spoiler)

Now, maybe I'm being too hard on him. He is in his late teens and early twenties for most of the book, and I guess his inability to cope and his slide into hedonism is "normal" for some (a lot?) of people that age. I went through my existential angst in other ways, but, I knew plenty of people who went that way. (Of course, I never particularly liked them, either.)

And this is, apparently, the start of a series, so maybe Quentin will grow in future books.

But in just this book, I didn't like him, or most of the rest of the characters, and because I didn't really like them, I found myself not caring about what was going to happen. And so I was mostly just bored. It reads like a character story, not a plot story, and there's large swatches where not much is going on - and it's hard to read a character story when you don't like the character and when he doesnt' seem to really change much throughout the book. Thus the boredom.

Well, bored at times, frustrated and annoyed at other times. But I never once felt like I was truly enjoying it, and I don't feel like I learned or got anything out of having read it - so it fails both as entertainment and as allegory.

Some people say this reads like an R-rated YA book. That it's target audience seems to be people of the same age and circumstances of the protagonist. At first I disagreed with this, but the more I think about it the more I think maybe they're correct. Perhaps if I had read this when I was younger, knee-deep in my own existential crises, perhaps then I would've enjoyed it more or gotten more out of it.

As it stands, in the here and now, I just didn't really like it all that much. I would almost be tempted to rate it 1-star but it wasn't all bad, and it does have it's moments, so 2-stars it is.(less)

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Sep 03, 2010

Jeremy rated it

Recommends it for: People who enjoy character and invention more than plot

Recommended to Jeremy by: The internet

One thing I'd like to get out of the way immediately: Whoever it was that said that this book was a shameless ripoff of Harry Potter is madly delusional, or at least overly defensive. I'm not just talking about the radically different tone or plot or age group, either. Aside from the fact that the first half (Yes, half. Five years of school in like...two hundred pages) is spent in a school of magic, I can see little resemblance. None of the spells or methods are notably similar, the game played ...moreOne thing I'd like to get out of the way immediately: Whoever it was that said that this book was a shameless ripoff of Harry Potter is madly delusional, or at least overly defensive. I'm not just talking about the radically different tone or plot or age group, either. Aside from the fact that the first half (Yes, half. Five years of school in like...two hundred pages) is spent in a school of magic, I can see little resemblance. None of the spells or methods are notably similar, the game played by its attendees (and face it, any school will have a sport it specializes in) is not just wildly different from Quidditch, it's enforced, and hardly anyone likes it. I'm sure there's more, but I'm tired.

Anyway, I liked it. I enjoyed the sheer creativity of the magic, including references to graduates of Brakebills going on to merge magic with chemistry and physics to really push the envelope of what a magician can do. Most of the characters were likable, even in their rampant unlikeability, which is a rare and wondrous thing. I also enjoyed the fact that there is almost no real plot, but rather the events serve character almost fully, rather than being ends in themselves. It allows Grossman to throw off ideas in half a sentence that many authors could write entire books about. Series, even.

My biggest complaint, the one that keeps this from being a five-star read, is the fantastically unsatisfying ending. I know there's a sequel coming, but that's no excuse. The entire book is about Quentin's disapproval and mistrust of himself and his self-sabotaging nature, and that's not resolved by the end. I don't feel like he's made any more progress than just recognizing the problem itself, and that took a pretty traumatic stimulus to provoke. Unless there are gonna be twelve of these things, each one going through each of the A.A.'s famous steps, that's kind of inexcusable. The last scene in the book itself contradicts Quentin's own (enlightened, at least from my perspective) realization that his fantasies will never fulfill him, and, by extension, staying in Fillory would prolong his already absurdly arrested development. But...hell. In a book this fun and this packed with ideas, it's hard to hate it because of a somewhat unfulfilling denouement.

Especially since there'll be a sequel.

If I had more time, I'd probably review in far greater detail, but for now, the rebuttal, approval, complaint, and bad joke shall have to suffice.(less)

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Apr 09, 2010

Carrie rated it

Shelves: 2010, fantasy, outcasts

What I liked about this was the library at Brakebills. Because magicians would rather just use a summoning spell instead of a card catalog, the library is gummed up with so many spells that magic doesn’t work very well in the building anymore. Plus, one of the librarians thought it would be cool if the books could fly around, so when someone requested one, it would fly directly to them. So he conjured a spell for that, except they also fly off the shelves other times too, and cluster at the t...more

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May 25, 2011

Ryan rated it

Reading Lev Grossman's The Magicians often reminded me of a line from "Barfruit Rules" by The Hold Steady.

These clever kids are killing me
For one they ain't that clever
Number two, it really sucks when you get stuck here with these Trevors
This was supposed to be a party

The Magicians is clever throughout, and Grossman often seems to go out of his way to ruin fantasy, even while paying homage to writers that we would probably be safe to assume wer...more

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Sep 18, 2010

Megan rated it

Shelves: fantasy, not-mine-library

The Goodreads synopsis for The Magicians claims that it mixes the magic of classics such as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, The Chronicles of Narnia, and A Wizard of Earthsea. I’ve never read Earthsea, but Lev Grossman borrows from and leans on the mythology and world building of Harry Potter, Narnia, and even Dungeons and Dragons (remember those days of role playing?!) so heavily that his writing goes from paying homage to copying to simply ludicrous imitation. Yes, he was obviously qui...moreThe Goodreads synopsis for The Magicians claims that it mixes the magic of classics such as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, The Chronicles of Narnia, and A Wizard of Earthsea. I’ve never read Earthsea, but Lev Grossman borrows from and leans on the mythology and world building of Harry Potter, Narnia, and even Dungeons and Dragons (remember those days of role playing?!) so heavily that his writing goes from paying homage to copying to simply ludicrous imitation. Yes, he was obviously quite influenced by these books, but unfortunately it was to the point that he was not very successful at creating his own world. Making things worse, for the majority of the book, Grossman tells us the story of Quentin’s life, rather than letting the story breathe and unfold on its own.

The Magicians reads as if it is the story of a story. All together, it is 402 pages long. In a mere 280 pages, we read about Quentin’s welcome to and discovery of a magical world. We follow him as he experiences 5 years of magician college and stay with him for a year or so afterwards as he tries to figure out what to do with his life. And of course during this time, Quentin develops friendships, finds a girlfriend, and does some soul searching. All in 280 pages. That simply isn’t enough space to write about one man’s immersion into a new culture (hell, a new world!), personal growth and existential crisis.

At page 281, Quentin and friends are transported to the magical world of Fillory. Grossman repeatedly tells us what a fantastical wonderful world Fillory is ~ but of course, it’s a made up a children’s series (that borrows quite heavily from The Chronicles of Narnia) that Quentin first discovered and loved as a child. And as he grew, unlike other kids, he never forgot or let go of his love of Fillory. My problem comes from the fact that Fillory, much like the rest of the novel, is special simply because Grossman tells us that it is. We don’t read excerpts from the books, or hear other characters discussing the books merits ~ but we do read Quentin’s thoughts on them pretty frequently. Maybe it’s just me, but I have a hard time giving a rat’s ass about something just because I am told that I should.

One thing that I can say in defense of Fillory is that, once Quentin and friends enter it, the writing undergoes a dramatic change. Suddenly Grossman slows down his pace, gives the story some room, and begins writing as a ...well ...writer rather than a story teller. The change in writing styles is so remarkable and so sudden that there is no doubt in my mind that Grossman has done this on purpose. It shows that while Quentin spends the majority of his life disillusioned and unaffected, in Fillory he can really come alive and become the man he was meant to be. Blah, blah blah. Unfortunately, at this point I had muddled through so much bad writing that I was long past caring about Quentin and his plight.

I like Grossman’s characters, and I like what he does with them. But I do not like being told, and told, and told what happens without ever getting a chance to experience the story for myself. And, frankly, much of this story has been done before and been done much, much better.
(less)

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Sep 13, 2011

Emily rated it

Shelves: 2009

The Magicians features Quentin Coldwater, an alienated Brooklyn high school student, who--en route to his alumni interview for Princeton--is instead transported to Brakebills, a college for magic located somewhere "upstate." Brakebills is his chance to escape from a mediocre high school life, spent pining after an unattainable classmate and escaping into "Fillory," the magical world of a British fantasy series called "Fillory and Further." After a five-year course o...moreThe Magicians features Quentin Coldwater, an alienated Brooklyn high school student, who--en route to his alumni interview for Princeton--is instead transported to Brakebills, a college for magic located somewhere "upstate." Brakebills is his chance to escape from a mediocre high school life, spent pining after an unattainable classmate and escaping into "Fillory," the magical world of a British fantasy series called "Fillory and Further." After a five-year course of study in magic, which the author Lew Grossman refreshingly dispenses with in a mere 200 pages, Quentin graduates and moves to New York with his friends. There, he realizes that being a certified magician has done nothing to alleviate his crushing anomie. Now a young adult, he loses himself, not in the Fillory books, but in alcohol. Then one of his classmates--a guy Quentin didn't even like at school--shows up and says that Fillory is real and he knows how to get there. Finally, they will get out of New York and into their dream of Fillory, "a world that has not yet been fucked up by assholes." This does not turn out as planned.

This book is in no way meant to be in the same genre as Harry Potter, Tolkien, or Narnia, though it directly references all three. Instead, it parodizes elements of those books while offering a Bildungsroman about the kind of person who is tempted to escape into them. Quentin is given an education that should equip him to do great things, but he never figures out what to do with his talents and asks very little of himself. He is a sympathetic character while also being mostly unlikeable. It's not surprising that his problems follow him from Brooklyn, to Brakebills, to New York, and beyond; it's no good to believe that things will be different for you in a new place if you haven't changed at all.

Readers seem to be very divided on this book, which is understandable, I suppose, if you're expecting J.K. Rowling and are given Donna Tartt. (I'm not claiming that Grossman is a comparable prose stylist, but the mood is there.) I expected to find it too quirky but ended up loving it. There may be one ending too many and a few slow spots, but I found it consistently funny, in the dialogue and descriptions, and in the overall irony of the plotting. I'd like to reread it, since there are real surprises at the end.(less)

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Jan 25, 2010

Sarah Pi rated it

Shelves: speculative-fiction

I expected The Magicians to be some sort of arch metacommentary on the genre from which it draws its inspiration, like the author's brother's Soon I Will Be Invincible. I actually didn't expect to like it, which made it a pleasant surprise, well written and well plotted. The capsule review I had seen called it an adult spin on Harry Potter; that's sort of true. It involves a school of magic and a bunch of teenagers, but it exists in our world, where Harry Potter has been written, and the charact...more

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Aug 21, 2009

The Holy Terror rated it

Recommends it for: fans of darker fantasy

Shelves: borrowed, sorcerers, dark-fantasy

Overall, this was an enjoyable book. It borrows heavily from many different fantasy motifs while still remaining original. In a sense you could say it's one part Harry Potter, one part Narnia, a splash of Peter Pan, with a sprinkling of The Wizard of Oz, and it's all of these yet none of them at once. Instead of being a blatant ripoff, The Magicians is more of a tribute to these famous stories while also being a bittersweet coming-of-age tale as well. This isn't a story for children though; it's...more

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Jun 16, 2011

Jennifer rated it

I can't be the first person who found this much buzzed book a little, well, boring. I was well over the half way mark and not too much was happening. Which, in hindsight, was probably all part of the author's evil plan. Grossman takes the first third of the book to so totally and completely immerse you in Quentin's awful, albeit magical late adolescence that you're practically writhing and cringing right along with him, and channeling his despair that magic doesn't always make everything better,...more

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Dec 27, 2009

Heather Clitheroe rated it

Shelves: 2009-a-year-of-books

I'm just about finished reading the book, and I think the only reason I'm still going is that I'd like to see how it ends. Not enjoying it. And lines like this?

"The little girl's hooded eyes expressed a precocious acquaintance with adversity."

Ugh.

Too many 'cute' allusions to Harry Potter and the Narnia books, too, mixed with a good dollop of the Fionavar Tapestry. Avoid, avoid, avoid. There is one good scene that I'll grudgingly admit to - the Beast...more

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About Lev Grossman

My novel The Magicians was a New York Times bestseller. The sequel, The Magician King, will be out on August 9. You can read the first three chapters of The Magicians online at Viking's website.

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