I have finally finished Lev Grossman’s The Magicians. I say ‘finally’ because it took a long time. Not because I’m a slow reader, but because I was extremely bored & thus kept finding other things to read in between chapters.
Why did I even finish it? Well, it’s hard to call yourself a sci-fi specialist and not have read the new hot thing. I feel a sense of responsibility to read the sequel. Yes, responsibility and dread.
Here’s the lowdown. Quentin Coldwater discovers he’s a magician during a weird standardized test. He goes away to magic school, leaving his parents easily because he feels about them what he feels about most things. Nothing. He matriculates. A bunch of boring stuff happens, including a lot of binge drinking. One disaster occurs; one vaguely interesting test is taken. Quentin is responsible for the disaster. He feels guilty about it for a paragraph or so.
Then, way after you want to reread Harry Potter again, the characters discover that the Narnia ripoff books they read as children were about a real realm & that they can go there. Amazingly, this does not make the book that much better. Blah, blah, blah, fight with the big bad, recuperate with centaurs who are exactly as dynamic as the hero: not at all.
This book keeps getting billed as an adult Harry Potter. What’s adult about it? Binge drinking. Emotionally unattached sex. Some cussing. A lack of description of spells, a cool school, or intriguing teachers. A satisfying build-up to the climax. Caring about the characters.
I’ll put it this way. The best part of this book is a quick description of why the library is awesome.
Towards the end of the book, Quentin is described this way: “He was an empty shell, roughly hollowed out by some crude tool, gutted and left there, a limp, raw, boneless skin.” Except Quentin has always been this way. It’s why he doesn’t really love anyone. It’s why he has no purpose or calling or talent. It’s why he drinks. It’s why I can’t picture him at all after reading about him for 402 pages! It’s why he never once wonders what he’ll do after school.
I suppose it’s why he’s called Coldwater. If books like Harry Potter arouse the senses and grab me emotionally, this is the cold shower that just makes me want to go to bed alone.
