posh.wiki / bookshelf
The Magicians by Lev Grossman
I don't have a great many printed books to hand. I used to have hundreds, across four or five bookshelves, back before I moved into my own place, but I took only a few books with me. It's been more than a year, now, and I still haven't bought shelves and brought all my books over. One of the few books I do have in my house is The Magicians by Lev Grossman. This series inspired 5 seasons of a TV show, which I have watched an unhealthy number of times since I was first introduced to it by its Tumblr fandom 5 years ago. I thought I might take on a more hefty book, since I anticipated having a number of short bursts of free time while attending a conference in London this past week, so The Magicians seemed like a great choice.
Spoiler alert: This post contains major spoilers for up to season 5 of the TV show, since the show heavily influenced the context with which I read this book.
I'd never heard much about the books. I went in with enough understanding to know roughly what was coming, but enough differences that I didn't feel like I was reading the same story I'd already seen. Some people say that the movie/series is never as good as the book, and complain endlessly about the screen writers warping the plot and discarding the author's original intentions. I've never been one to hold that opinion - I think that if a screenplay is allowed its room to breathe as a derivative work instead of trying and inevitably failing to be a perfect copy, it can both make the second medium a consumer sees more intriguing with its plot differences, and allows the screen writers to add pieces of their own while staying true to the author's messages. If there even were any. Not everything is trying to say something!
In the finale of season 4, Quentin, our "main character" (you'll see why that's not so accurate soon) dies. This is the last we see of him. Even though there is an afterlife, and we've seen into it before, Q's death is final. The idea I took from this episode is that the writers (maybe Lev Grossman himself, if this was also in the books) wanted to challenge the idea that the mostly-straight-passing (canonically bi and implied polyamorous) white male character was the single star of the series. This did indeed get me to think... Sure, the show started with Quentin, but quickly established separate story lines for the rest of the main cast, and one argue that nobody was any more or less of a main character than anybody else. I was asking myself, did I think that Quentin was the main character, and would I be justified in doing so? The book, however... It follows Quentin's perspective. At least for the duration of this book, there is less doubt in my mind that he is the main character. Side note: I will never forgive the writers for that HEARTBREAKING queerbait they pulled.
I do wish I got to see more of the perspectives of the other characters (especially Julia, I just love her), I do think that keeping one perspective made the experience more comfortable for me. I've always had trouble following multiple perspectives in the form of a book, to the point where it's caused me to DNF quite a few. Don't get me wrong, I don't mean to say that I don't think Lev Grossman would be able to do it well, or that anyone else I've read did it badly. This is just a note on personal preference.
Reading a book with this amount of context about the series has been a rather unique experience. I often found myself thinking, did the author know where the story was going when he wrote this part? Am I right about what I think will happen next? And most importantly: do the books tell a story past the season 5 finale, after which the show was cancelled? I hope so. I could read a series about this world as big as the cosmere, or the wheel of time, or the forgotten realms.
It's noted at one point that the character Christopher Plover pronounces his name "the English way ("Pluvver")". Being from England myself, it had never occurred to me that it might be pronounced any differently. I looked it up, and apparently "pluvver" is a common mispronunciation in American English, and it should rhyme with "over". I also learned that it has a meaning beyond being a name: it refers to a species of bird, and is used in the names of some other similar species.
At a certain point I began to wonder if I would get more reading done if I had this as an e-book. There had been a few occasions on which i've found myself with the time and even the desire to read, but didn't have the book with me, so I got the e-book, which did come in useful a few times. I did find, however, that I was more likely to want to read when I had the physical book with me, so I think I should focus more effort on carrying around a physical book than acquiring e-books.
I noticed that in the series, many names are changed. Janet becomes Margo (though they do re-use the name Janet), and the book's Amanda Orloff, who dies rather early on, seems to have been adapted into Kady Orloff-Diaz. I also noticed that I didn't notice anything about Marina. Essentially, the show added a whole secondary storyline, which I missed while reading the book. Notably also, they genderbent professor Bigby in the series, and I think they added some much-appreciated diversity by changing Penny's appearance and background.
The way that The Magicians' magic system has an element of historical magic also inspired me to buy a copy of anthony Grafton's "Magus", which might end up being the next thing I read, from a bookshop at St Pancreas* station.
My final note: I've noticed a little bit of an increase in motivation to get through one book now that I have others that I want to get around to reading. Sure, I was motivated to get through The Magicians in part because it's a good book, but also because I'm looking forward to reading other things too.
*I'm well aware that I didn't spell that right. I did it just to annoy you. Yes, you, specifically. You know who you are.