Customer Reviews

The Magician King: A Novel

5 star:		(44)
4 star:		(32)
3 star:		(16)
2 star:		(15)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

Can it possibly be only two years since I read Lev Grossman's The Magicians? If you asked me about that novel, I would immediately tell you that I loved it. Apparently, that's about all I could tell you. Having just read Grossman's engaging follow-up, I regret not having reread, or at least brushed up on, the first novel. References to prior events were plentiful, and rather than jog my memory, they highlighted just how fallible it is. Hopefully yours is better, or you will take the steps I didn't prior to reading the sequel. Oh, and it goes without saying that if you haven't read the first novel, don't start with this one.

Nonetheless, my inexact memory did not keep me from enjoying the latest adventures of Quentin Coldwater et al. Even I recalled that at the end of The Magicians Quentin, Julia, Elliott, and Janet had left our world to become the co-queens and kings of the magical (and not fictional after all) land of Fillory. The end. I thought that was the end. It was a good ending, and I didn't expect any more. As we catch up with Quentin and co., they are living their "happy ever after." It's glorious. It's perfect. It's boring. To some degree, this has ever been the issue of life in a magical world.

Quentin is itching for a quest, but this is countered by the reasonable fear of screwing up a perfect life. When a safe-looking mini-quest comes along, Quentin goes for it--and screws up his perfect life. The mini-quest evolves into a major-quest with the highest of stakes. While this primary drama is unfolding, there is a second story being told in reflection. The Magicians recounted the education and coming of age of Quentin, Elliott, and Janet. Finally we learn what "hedgewitch" Julia was doing all of those years, and how she learned her craft. It would be an understatement to say that she took a different path. It's a fascinating counterpoint. Along the way of these twin narratives, we meet many new characters and revisit old ones.

I've now read three of Mr. Grossman's four novels, and I've enjoyed all of them. If I had to pick out the one thing that sets his work apart, the word that comes to mind is "unpredictability." When you read as much as I do, a lot of storytelling becomes formulaic. This isn't always a bad thing. Formula can expedite storytelling or give shape to a narrative. In any case, I think most avid readers begin to get a feel for where a story is likely to go. But not with Mr. Grossman. I never know. I don't have a clue. I just know that he's going to pull something different and unexpected out of his magician's hat.

Additionally, it's always a pleasure to read his prose. And he's a champion at world-building. I adore the world he's created in Fillory, and the dozens and dozens of pop culture references found throughout the text increase the fun and anchor that world to the reality of our own. It's not merely Rowling and Lewis and Tolkien. It's Die Hard and Star Trek and D & D. It's Elmer Fudd, Dr. Suess, and GEB. It's Disney, Dr. Who, and Discworld--and too many more to ever list.

I've rated this novel down one star only because I didn't love it quite as much as its predecessor. I had the opportunity to speak to Mr. Grossman briefly at BEA. Expressing surprise at the sequel, I asked if there would be more books in the series. He told me that he thinks there will be a third, making it a trilogy. This second book comes to a shocking and unresolved conclusion. So, to Lev Grossman I say, "Damn straight there will be a third book!" It can't end like this. And while clearly I have NO idea where the tale will go, I WILL be along for the ride.

Not as good as The Magicians. This book felt rushed to publication, as the author seemed to default to "the item magically appears so that quest could be completed..." theme over and over and over. My impression of the first book was that the reader would come to that same conclusion (that fortuitous events mystically occurred occasionally in order to move the quest along), but in the first book, such intervention of "fate" seemed indirect and subtle. In the sequel, the appearence of the missing items doesn't surprise the reader (or the characters within the story) and appeared to be the norm and not the exception.

I still love the author's books and his numerous references to modern events and terminology, but overall, the book was mildly disappointing. The first book seemed so "meaty," with exhaustive portions of the story containing riveting explanations of unusual people, places, events, emotions and relationships. (Who didn't love the development of friendships and antagonistic relationships at Brakebills?). The sequel, on the other hand, seems rushed, with very little for us to sink our teeth into. In the first book I found myself loving (and rooting for) many of the main characters and I empathized with so many of the characters in so many of the scenes. Who wasn't heartbroken when primary and secondary characters died in the first book?

In the sequel, the characters seemed to simply be scenery. They just seemed emotionally checked out and disconnected from each other (none of them seemed to rely on each other for anything in the least). I didn't find myself emotionally invested in the characters in the sequel. It almost seemed like most of the characters showed up for brief cameo appearences, but the characters almost didn't acknowledge each other being in the same scene at the same time and their friendships and their relationships didn't evolve. They didn't love, fight or hate. I think the author lost sight of the fact that we the readers loved the interaction between the characters in the first book most of all (even above the occurrence of the remarkable events themselves).

After hearing about "The Magicians" on NPR, I picked up the first book in this series and was completely enthralled. It was a rewarding exploration of a problem that is rarely addressed--what could possibly motivate a character who, through power or technology, can address every level of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs...except, of course, for those difficult-to-get ones like meaning, self-knowledge, and so on. It was a Postmodern Harry Potter (I mean that in only the nicest possible way)--ironic, disdainful of happy endings, and realistic.

At this point, the only seriously negative review of this book on Amazon points out that it's thick with in-jokes and pop culture references. And it is, and in a certain sense that's an easy, jarring, almost parasitic sort of humor, I can see how it might seriously put a wrench in one's suspension of disbelief. But in Grossman's world the device adds to the feeling of being immersed in the geek/internets jaded, referential culture--and I think it reflects how Grossman's characters, at least at the beginning of their story arcs, are consumers rather than producers. Until we meet Julie, our wizards are fonts of received wisdom, brilliant students perhaps, but inward-focused beasts more enthralled with their own wit and personal tragedies than putting their near-omnipotence into any meaningful use. I'm strongly reminded of Pamela Dean's "Tam Lin" title, where the characters spin delightful chains of wit, fabulous crystals of logophilia that could only develop in the zero-G environment of fiction.

Aaanyway...I did love this book, it might actually have been as good a story as the first. But it was a bit "more of the same," without the magic of discovery of the first book--for the characters (well, except for Julie, her "origins" story carries through the book and keeps the sparkle of the new in the title), and for the reader, who is now already aware of the epidemic of Weltschmerz in the magical community. It was a solid book, but the first one was fresh and new, the second is a happy return to the first one's ideas--and probably not a very satisfying stand-alone novel.

The title leans rather heavily on Narnia, and a lot of the fun of the book was in how those ideas were woven into this title in a big way--if the first book was 30something JK Rowling, the second is the same for CS Lewis. I'm not sure if this is a bad thing, but I am reminded of why the "Allegory" literary style died out--creating 1:1 correspondences is a little artless. I'm absolutely not saying that this was the case here, I felt that the book used Narnia tropes in a most satisfactory way, but if a college professor (or an amazon reviewer) wrote "derivative, see me" on this thesis, they could make a solid case for an A-, or even a B+.

The concept that drew me to these two books was that they're an adult literary treatment of a concept that has largely been addressed with either young adult or pulp adult writing and characters. I feel like The Magicians squeaked by in meeting that criteria (although the moral center did not hold). The Magician King does not. I think this does work as pretty good fantasy. There's a good deal of inventiveness, plot twists based on the created rules of the world, characters we basically care about. There's one very high quality creation in the gods which is severely underexploited. But overall, it's not great fantasy.

But it is definitely not literary. The quality of the writing has dropped significantly from the first book, and a great deal of it seems plain lazy. I don't think any of this would bother me except for the fact that I think Lev Grossman has the chops to do this right. There have been astounding sequences - e.g. Brakebills South, and I think that LG has brought a character to the page that is new to literature but common to life - nose to the grindstone type, with the realistic tradeoffs that are made to become good at something. There's a working metaphor with magic and writing that is working under the surface that he is able to tap to create a credible portrait of a teenager learning to become a powerful magician. That's no mean feat.

The book that comes to mind, and that I'm probably unfairly expecting, is The Corrections. The Corrections starts in the slang and quotidian of the suburbs, but elevates that life to literature. I think part of the reason that this works is that The Corrections knows what it is: literature. There's a burden on it to raise and explore a moral question, and if not to answer it, then to suggest why the answer is difficult to arrive at.

The Magicians starts in that vein, and there are legitimate moral questions to address: how do you live life without magic, once you know it exists? That's a fantastic metaphor, and something that almost all of us address in our lives when we see people operating in a profession that we are unable to break into. How many actors are there trying to get a movie? How man movie stars that want to direct? A lazy example, but we all have them, barring perhaps a very few that succeed on their own terms in their chosen field.

/***************Spoiler Alert*********************************/

Does the Magicians end on that note and address the question, no, it steps away by whisking Quentin into magicland as soon as the answers get difficult. Does the Magician King? Maybe, but credits roll immediately, so there's no exploration of a viable answer. Every time somebody almost loses magic, they get it back, so the author himself seems to be having a hard time getting off the (magic) sauce. Good luck for his characters.

There's some sort of moral teaching about sacrifice and maturity, but that doesn't rise to the level of interesting for me. More importantly, it's not a question that has to be answered with this world, magic doesn't have that much to do with it. You could bring up the same thing in a GI Joe cartoon if you left out the parachutes.

/**************End Spoiler Alert*************************/

In the end, I feel like these books don't know what they want to be. When there's a difficult moral question, magic resolves it or alleviates it. When there's a time to dazzle with imagination, there are ironic borrowings (sure, they're allusions) to suggest that the book is a literary commentary on the genre. In the end, neither the criteria for literature or fantasy are quite satisfied. It works as decent fantasy with some gen x, bordering on y material, but I'm too old to be reading something like that, and in the end, I'm a little embarrassed I spent my time this way.

I enjoyed the first book despite its shortcomings and looked forward to reading this sequel. I even paid full price for both. Now that I have read the sequel, I can't say that I feel the same way about its inevitable follow-up.

We start with Quentin and the three people who picked him up at the end of the last book (Julia, Eliot, and Janet) well established as the rulers of Fillory. Like Narnia, which Grossman rips off even more blatantly in this book than he did in the last, Fillory has two kings and two queens. We skipped over exactly why or how this came to be and no explanation is offered in this book. We DO get a detailed explanation for how Julia became a magician without an acceptance to Brakebills. The story is interesting, but I disliked it for personal reasons. I just take umbrage with any person, fictional or non, who blames their failures on other people. Julia's story is filled with whining about how she deserved to get into Brakebills and she blames everyone except herself for flunking the exam that got her rejected in the first place. INCLUDING QUENTIN, which suddenly becomes a major plot point in the last ten pages of the novel. And since Grossman never establishes that she even WANTED to be a magician in the first place, her attitude is even harder to deal with. Why is she so determined to get into a world she never had much desire to join in the first place? She just wants it because she can't have it. And [BIG SPOILER ALERT!!] that story ends with a crazy rape scene that just pops out of the blue with zero warning and zero context or relevance. There's much to be said about a male author who subjects a female character to rape and then tries to use that as some kind of empowerment.

So first the story is Quentin wanting a quest or some adventure to take him out of his palatial boredom. That veers into Quentin getting moved back to Earth by accident, then trying to get back. Once he gets back, he joins a quest that's nearly over, we get one confusing "action" scene that is honestly very poorly written, and then we learn about a huge, end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it danger 3/4ths of the way through the book. Luckily, this danger can be solved by completing the quest THEY'RE ALREADY ON. And then Surprise!, fifty pages later, quest's over and the danger is gone. WE SEE NO ACTION in this book except for the aforementioned bad scene. There are DRAGONS in this book and it's STILL BORING!! How does that happen? Something somewhere went seriously wrong in the writing of this novel. My guess is that Grossman decided to rip off "The Voyage of the Dawn Treader" practically verbatim then wimped out of that and cobbled together another story to staple onto that one instead. If you're going to rip something off, just go for it! Do it all the way, or don't do it at all. Like the crew of the Dawn Treader, the characters here sail east to various islands looking for lost things that are scattered across the Eastern sea. As they go, the sea gets more shallow and the sun gets more intense, until they reach a place where the world ends. UNLIKE Dawn Treader, we don't actually get to see most of the islands they visit, even though they're named on the map in the front and back of the book. Eliot sums them all up in once sentence for Quentin, and we move right along to the END of that story. In another scene, a character returns to announce that there will be a battle waged between Gods and magicians, and that DRAGONS are helping them fight it. All these dragons burst out, then Quentin leaves to go do something else. WE DON'T GET TO SEE THE DRAGON FIGHT.

What kind of a writer comes up with or rips off awesome ideas for a story, then FAILS to actually WRITE ABOUT THEM?? Why the heck did he choose to ONLY write about the boring parts of this journey? I would have preferred to follow them on their sea adventure and have Quentin show up and briefly explain the boring crap he did on Earth while everyone else was having a good time. Quentin simply isn't an interesting enough character to follow unless he's doing something pretty cool. I didn't realize that in the last book because he WAS doing something that was interesting to read about, and Grossman wrote it pretty well. That is not the case here.

Sorry there are so many spoilers in this review, but I just don't know how to explain my frustration with it without spoiling things a bit. And summing up that frustration in words was harder than I thought it would be. The bottom line is that Grossman had all the plot elements and ingredients to make this book good, but he mixed them all up and told them in the wrong order and in the wrong way, so all we're left with is a peek at what the book COULD have been if he'd handled it better. It's a mess, is what I am trying to say. It's just a really complete and total mess. VERY disappointing.

Based on how things "end" there will have to be a sequel to this. I won't be reading it unless I get a free copy and have a lot of free time.

In 2009, Lev Grossman's THE MAGICIANS took the fantasy world by storm. We followed a cadre of young magical elites as they adventured through the wizard-college-that-isn't-Hogwarts and the land-of-magical-animals-that-isn't-Narnia. And we watched their realizations that magical escapes aren't all they're cracked up to be, as they --- and the fantasy genre --- grew up. His sequel takes these themes in a darker direction, as bildungsroman becomes transformative fantasy in a story that may make you reconsider how you read the genre forever.

"The novel is a code book of fantasy references and reflections. But you don't need a fantasy literature pedigree to get the jokes."

THE MAGICIAN KING picks up with our 20-something wizards as kings and queens of Fillory, the Narnia-that-isn't-Narnia. Their story begins where most fantasies end: the happily ever after. Their lifelong dreams achieved, their demons (literal and figurative) defeated, life is full of drinking and hunting and gallivanting in a giant castle. But beneath the thin veneer of magical contentment, we're quick to learn that no one --- still --- is actually happy with their lives. And the world isn't as it should be. THE MAGICIAN KING is a darker, more brooding story than its predecessor. It explores the cruelty of our ambitions and the flimsiness of our dreams. And it continues to poke at the fantasy genre with a pointy stick until uncomfortable truths bleed out.

It turns out there's little to do for the royalty of a perfect magical realm. To relieve their boredom, our protagonist Quentin and his former high school crush Julia embark on a deliberately arbitrary quest for a meaningless prize. So enthusiastic for adventure --- no matter how contrived --- they push and push until they go too far, stumbling into the place they hoped never to see again: the real world. The framing quest of the novel is to merely return to where they started, and where they weren't that happy anyway.

The real treasure, and surprise, of THE MAGICIAN KING is Julia, a character readers only encountered briefly in the first novel. Denied admission to Brakebills, the elite magical college Quentin and friends attended, Julia was forced to learn her magic on the streets, an education of brutal sacrifice in safe houses with magic junkies. In a story stuffed with over-privileged kids who received the gift of magic on a silver platter, reading Julia's harsh backstory is refreshing. It is, of course, a metaphor for the absurd inequality of our education system today. But Grossman's #1 rule of fantasy is that nothing is just metaphor. Reading Julia is soul-stirring, the reason we care about books and the characters who inhabit them.

Grossman has peppered THE MAGICIAN KING with other pleasures to offset the gloomy atmosphere. The novel is a code book of fantasy references and reflections. But you don't need a fantasy literature pedigree to get the jokes. Grossman's favorite subject, it seems, is the peculiar arbitrariness of magic and the structure of fantasy stories. Gaining access back to Fillory is made less the reward of good work or a good soul than it is a happy accident. Ember, the god-of-Fillory-that-isn't-Narnia's-Aslan, is presented less as a font of fantastic wisdom than as a stentorian bureaucrat, an enforcer of the ridiculous rules that govern heroic quests. Though these are serious and sad absurdities, they're even more an in-joke commentary for anyone who's ever read fantasy, and a dastardly fun one at that.

This is not Grossman dissing magic and fantasy. He loves it far too much. Instead it's a sleight-of-hand trick to make us consider what fantasy and magic are all about it. For Grossman, it seems, the sad truth is that fantasy is less childlike escape than it is a form of longing that cannot be fulfilled. And magic --- usually presented as both an end in itself and a means to a life where everything works out --- is the punishment that keeps on giving. Not only does it fail to bring happiness to Quentin and his friends, it can't even help them escape their unhappy lives.

THE MAGICIAN KING robs us of our fantasy innocence. While the Harry Potter and Chronicles of Narnia series hint that magic isn't a cure-all to our problems, they never doubt that it improves their characters' lives. With both comic lightness and deadly seriousness, Grossman dashes that assumption. The effect is refreshing: we don't need magic to make us happy, and if escapism doesn't work, perhaps we won't long for it as much. That THE MAGICIAN KING is such a wonderful escapist yarn is just another of Grossman's delicious ironies, a joke that will keep you smiling well after the last page.

--- Reviewed by Max Falkowitz

There's a ton to gush about with regard to The Magician King, from the rich characterization to the quick sense of humor, but if there's one thing to open with, it's the fact that it's a complete joy to find a sequel that's not interested in just rehashing its predecessor, but instead builds on and expands the world already created in the first book of the series. While The Magicians focused on the characters coming of age and embracing the challenges of adulthood, The Magician King finds them down the road, having embraced life but wondering if this is all there is. And when it turns out there may be more to life than just being the royalty of a mythical land ruled by magic, The Magician King turns into a modern adaptation of children's quest novels like The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, as our characters sail from island to island on a quest whose stakes become clearer and more serious as the book develops. Grossman alternates between chapters about the quest and telling the story of Julia, a minor character from the first novel whose backstory and personal development becomes far more critical here, not only as a counterpoint to the privileged lives of Quentin and friends but also as the gateway to the book's themes, which turn out to be far more grim and bleak than you might expect. If I have a small grumble about The Magician King, it's that the book's themes don't really flow throughout the book the way they did in The Magicians, which makes the (admittedly powerhouse and stunning) ending feel a little more out of nowhere. But that's a small gripe, especially when weighed against the fact that the book's pacing, plotting, and storytelling may outdo the original in a lot of weighs. If you loved The Magicians, there's no way you can skip this one; in continuing the story and the lives of the characters, Grossman has created, for lack of a better phrase, a young adult novel that's definitely for an adult audience, and has done so with humor, excitement, and honest, heartfelt, powerful emotional impact and consequences far beyond the tepid "lessons" of so many books of its ilk.

The Magician King is the sequel to 2009's The Magicians. My review copy was most generously provided by the good people at Viking/Penguin.

WARNING: there is some spoiler text here if you are not familiar with the series. It is, after all, difficult to talk about a sequel without referencing the original story. And in do doing, some of the original story's plot points and twists will be at least somewhat revealed. So consider yourself warned.

For those of you unfamiliar with the series, let me give you a quick synopsis: magic is real and there is a school (Brakebills) for magicians that only select teenagers manage to make their way into - although it is possible to learn about magic without attending Brakebills, it is a difficult road to travel. There is series of fictional books-within-the-books that take place in an alterna-world called Fillory (which world - and attendant mythology - bears more than passing resemblance to Narnia). Fillory is also real. The books center around Quentin - one of those who managed to find his way to Brakebills (and graduate with rather high honors) and Fillory -and if there is a more stereotypical disaffected anti-hero type in fiction, I don't know where to find him... This is not intended as a bad thing, mind you, just as a means of making you understand who the main character is. Quentin is supported by a team of mostly similar-minded magicians - they are all too smart for their own good and fully aware of that fact. As a result, they seem to fall prey to the classic ennui of those "suffering" from superiority complexes.

Now that you know who you are dealing with, and have a very bare-bones sense of their world, let's turn to The Magician King. I read The Magicians when it came out in 2009. I didn't remember all of the details of the book - this is also not intended as a bad thing. This happens to me a lot - I read voraciously and quickly because I get absorbed into stories. As a result, I often don't remember many of the details of books, even those I love, after I have read them. I always remember the gist, and if there is a character/setting/plot point that is particularly appealing, I will remember that. I also usually remember how the book left me feeling - glad I read it, eager to read more about the story/characters/setting, or not. So the fact that I didn't remember all of the details did not signify anything to me. I did remember that I found the premise interesting though, and because of that I made sure to re-read The Magicians in time for the sequel to arrive.

I must confess, I did not love that re-read - not all of it, anyway. I did love the beginning - Quentin's adventures into the world of magic, his entry into Brakebills and his magical education, were excellent. Grossman's approach to magic and the magical world is well conceived and presented, his characters have very strong personalities (even those who are timid or meek, and the fact that he can accomplish that is, to me, testament to his skill as a writer), and his universe is just enough off of reality to let the reader envision themselves in it - especially the reader who, like me, always dreamed that he/she was special and meant for something more in this world... But then Quentin and his friends graduated. And the self-indulgent and self-pitying and long-suffering, woe-is-me tidbits of their lives - and especially of Quentin's aggrieved magical boy personality - got to me. The subsequent Fillorian adventure brought me back to the story, but only for a short time - then Quentin became too Quentin again and I got annoyed.

Still, I looked forward to The Magician King for the moments of brilliance that I so enjoyed in the first book.

And they are there. Once again, the book contains sections of story that are original and intriguing and absorbing - and I loved those sections. But once again, Quentin and his friends got to me. I don't necessarily blame an author when his characters annoy me - often, that is the point. I get it, I really do. But that doesn't mean I enjoy reading it. This was a prime example. There were again some truly innovative and excruciatingly well-written passages - there were also, again, some descriptions that felt over-done and cliched and some travels/travails that felt all too predictable for anyone who has ever read about alterna-worlds like Narnia or about "regular" people finding themselves in magical worlds.

I kind of think this may be the point. It took me until the end of the book to realize it, though.

I think it is entirely possible that Grossman is, in part, writing an indictment (maybe assessment is a better word - indictment may sound too confrontational; then again, maybe that is again part of the point) of the whole "I'm meant for more, and once I realize my uniqueness the world will see!" persona and of the "Once I make my way into the "better" world of magic, life will be better!" mentality so often attendant to it. If that is the case, then wow - he got it in one. (Well, technically two, but you know what I mean. teehee)

If he isn't, well, it was still an enjoyable read don't get me wrong, but it had moments during which I wanted to set it down in favor of something light-hearted and fun and just not so weighing-me-down-ish. I can only read about angst for so long before I get worn out. But indictments of people like me, who fantasize about alterna-worlds, well, those I can read all day.

Note: This review is based on the Audible version of "The Magician King."

With "The Magicians", Lev Grossman yanked Harry Potter and The Chronicles of Narnia out of the idyllic setting of our dreams and set them in the real world, grimy and dingy and tarnished. The book wandered and certainly sagged some in the middle, but the ending was satisfying and somehow complete. With "The Magician King", it becomes apparent that the first book was Grossman's "A New Hope", a mostly introductory work that could be taken on its own but is really a gateway to a much bigger story. This is The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Empire Strikes Back rolled into one, a sequel that ups the stakes for the heroes while also laying down some important backstory.

Grossman hasn't lost his penchant for using modern idioms and trying his darndest to keep the speech of his leads true to their origins, and at times it can be grating, but he does a better job here. With "The Magicians", you understood that sometimes characters said things that were dumb because their dialogue was meant to feel unscripted. Real people talk in cliches, they quote "Scarface", they don't always say the right thing. Now that he's more firmly entrenched in the world he's constructed, more familiar with his characters, he finds a happy medium with things real people would say while also limiting the grimaces. He also introduces a few new characters that lighten the overall tone of the book, replacing some of the sad-sack Physical Kids with more confident, positive influences.

"The Magicians" was a coming-of-age book, a story about what it meant to leave childhood behind, to find meaning once you leave the rails of schooling, to live in your own skin, and what people would do with their lives once magic made their old, normal goals seem tiny and useless without replacing them with anything of importance. What are your goals once your goals have been achieved? If the whole world is your oyster, what's the point? With the sequel, Grossman has taken on a few new themes, tackling the concepts behind the fantasy quest mythos with the maturation that becoming an adult really tasks us with, which is about more than paying bills, holding down a job, and carrying health insurance. The book also drives home the human nature of being absurdly grateful one moment for the simple things while always needing more in the afterglow of success or salvation, how it is only human to never really be happy, that our natures will often prevent us from recognizing the good times until they're over and cannot be regained.

What's most impressive about "The Magician King" is how much happens. There isn't much combat to be had in its pages, but Grossman keeps the plot skipping along so briskly that even the endless detours are a fascinating curiosity as the plot rolls downhill, picking up momentum until the book reaches a climax of immense power. Grossman continues to fill in bits of the magical world while never losing creative steam, with a new world or twist around every bend. There are some elements that get less play than I expected, and sometimes Grossman abuses "quest logic" to keep things tidier than they would likely be, but the heart of the story receives the proper attention, and that's what stayed with me after I finished.

"The Magician King" also includes chapters that follow Julia, Quentin's friend (and crush) before he went to Brakebills Academy, on her own journey that takes place during the time frame of the first book. This plotline is covered in chapters that break up the main plot, rising in dramatic tension in tandem with the rest of the story, and her perspective and progression is every bit as fascinating as the tale the book is more focused on.

In interviews, Grossman has confirmed this is the second act of a larger work, and while I felt the first book ended beautifully, I have to admit that I'm ravenous for the next one. The story told here is immensely satisfying, and the characters that were often frustrating and grating in "The Magicians" are so much more pleasurable and interesting to spend time with as they outgrow adolescence and really come into their own. I can't wait to find out what's next.

The Magicians: A Novel by Lev Grossman confused me when I read it last year. I wanted to like it, I really did, but I just slogged through the first 3/4s. Luckily, the finale was amazing, and it kept me interested enough to invest in this volume of the series.

The Magician King is the middle entry in what I believe to be a trilogy. Grossman definitely has enough world-building power to extend the series beyond 3 volumes, so time will tell how long this lasts. Although, in my opinion, it is an improvement over the first book, The Magician King definitely suffers from the same slow pacing problems and magical plot elements.

The idea behind this series is "adult fantasy." Keeping along with that theme, the reader picks up the book to begin with Quentin and his friends in Fillory, kings and queens. Although they have everything they want, Quentin isn't living so happily-ever-after and years for adventure. When a sketchy clock tree shows up after 20 pages of long exposition, it is time to get down and dirty.

Or not. There are a few misfires, but once this thing gets going, it really gets going.

As the story of Quentin and sailing to the End of the World unfolds, little chapters of Julia (the hedge witch)'s back story gets folded in between, mostly an every-other pattern. Julia's story is infinitely interesting, and the main plot line had some good moments too. the problem is, as soon as I got comfortable and interested in one over the course of a well-written chapter, the book switched to the other. It lacked flow and the overall experience was jarring.

Lev Grossman has a particular talent, like Stephen King, to drag things out and still make them interesting,a always with the promise of a great climax on the horizon. And if you enjoyed the ending of the Magicians, then you will ave your jaw dropped (like I did) while reading the conclusion to Julia's story, and then the main one.

I highly recommend this book to fans of the first. For those new to the series entirely, I don't know if I would recommend them to start the first book. Only the third volume will tell me that. In the mean time, though, read some reviews and plot synopses, and if you like fantasy, go for it. These books suffer massive pacing problems, but if you stick with them, they reward you.