Lev Grossman, The Magicians trilogy (spoiler tags used for third book, The Magician's Land)

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Koolkat,

I found the narcissism overblown. I have some friends with a touch but no one who is anywhere near as over the top as the "Physical Kids". I don't understand why Quentin would hang around a group people, particularly the one woman who enjoys poaching, for as long as he did. They're assholes.

If Quentin ever did love Alice he and she should have struck out on their own instead of playing, then playing some more. I know that much about relationships if you expect them to last you have to understand that fun does happen, it just happens after the work is done.

Make any sense?

[Shryke]

I didn't think they were big assholes. Alot of them sounded like fun people to hang out with. There's a few rough spots, but everyone has annoying qualities.

And I don't think Magician culture was narcissitic so much as it was ... pointless. Or maybe, as koolkat put it, without responsibility. This is really the thrust of Alice's point. You say "fun happens after the work is done", but my question is: What work? None of them need to work or, really, to do much of anything they don't want to.

They have all this power and nothing to do with it. Just like Quentin has all this power and potential, but never does anything with it because there's nothing (or very little) that really challenges him. (He does step up to some extent when those challenges happen though.)

Which is, I think, the point of Fillory and the whole ending sequence. It represents a world where you have purpose and meaning to Quentin. And it turns out, his life has not actually prepared him for that.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Shryke,

I think the pointlessness and narcissism are part of a feedback loop. Each adding to the other. You've got to have something to do with your life or you going to end up filling it with crap to pass the time. Crap that is frequently damaging.

[Liadin]

My impression was that Quentin hung out with the people he did because it was easy, they accepted him and so he had a ready-made clique. He liked having a group of friends with their own special clubhouse and so on, and when he had that, he wasn't going to make any effort to hang out with other people. A lot of people are like this in real life--we fall into a routine even if our friends annoy us sometimes. It seemed like they all got along for the most part, so why would Quentin have dropped them?

[aimlessgun]

A lot of people are like this in real life--we fall into a routine even if our friends annoy us sometimes. It seemed like they all got along for the most part, so why would Quentin have dropped them?

Havnt read the book, but agree with this sentiment in general. Once someone is your friend, you stick with them despite their faults (at least I do). They'd have to do something really awful for me to cut myself off.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

aimlessgun,

These people were not friends they were absolute jackasses. They used each other like moist towelettes then discarded each other when the no longer wanted each other. If they were "friends" it was nothing like any friendship experience I've ever participated in.

[Shryke]

aimlessgun,

These people were not friends they were absolute jackasses. They used each other like moist towelettes then discarded each other when the no longer wanted each other. If they were "friends" it was nothing like any friendship experience I've ever participated in.

When did they use each other? When did they discard each other?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Shryke,

I'd have to re-read the novel to give you specifics. I read it last year shortly after it was released. I just remember thinking Quentin's group at Breakbills seemed like a pack of assholes.

[Shryke]

I think you've got a weird opinion of the series then. They never struck me as a pack of assholes. They were just a group of kids forging their identity around being the group mostly. And, you now, hanging out and enjoying each others company.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Shryke,

I thought the book was okay. I just thought Quentin was extremely unlikable all the way through the book.

This is my review:

http://serscot.livej...l.com/6435.html

Here's a link to a review of the book that I did back in November of 09 right after I finished. I read it, and the remainder of my comments in this thread to refresh my memory. Yes, I still think Quentin was an asshole. However, I think Grossman did this on purpose to make a point about narcissism and escapism in Fantasy generally. Read my review for a fresher take on the book.

[NoSpeakEnglish]

I didn't like this novel, I felt it was a derivative of many novels and the characters weren't sympathetic. I really don't get the reason of it getting big.

[alguien]

Grossman managed to make the prospect of learning magic... not very magical.

You know who the students reminded me of? A group of people I know who went to Carlton College. Very smart. Very lazy. Full of potential, ennui, and angst. Also, annoying as hell after an hour.

This book had potential but didn't live up to it. The protagonist is a selfish coward, but instead of being enjoyable, like say Fraser's Flashman, he comes across as a Holden Caulfield wannabe who stumbles into a Harry Potter school where there's very little tension.

Without Narnia or Harry Potter, this book wouldn't exist, which says something. Had it been able to stand on its own, it would have been a hell of a book.

[Guest Raidne]

Weren't we supposed to think they were really bad friends to each other? Isn't that kind of the whole point?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Raidne,

That was my impression.

[Guest Raidne]

One of the book club questions I ran across noted that Janet was lazy and never at the top of the class for anything, whereas Alice was truly gifted, and yet, at the end, it's Janet who's a Queen in Fillory and Alice is, well, you know....Grossman said something in an interview about wanting to bring the real world into the fantasy setting, where there is this magical escapism, but people are still shallow jerks.

[aidan]

Grossman managed to make the prospect of learning magic... not very magical.

You know who the students reminded me of? A group of people I know who went to Carlton College. Very smart. Very lazy. Full of potential, ennui, and angst. Also, annoying as hell after an hour.

This book had potential but didn't live up to it. The protagonist is a selfish coward, but instead of being enjoyable, like say Fraser's Flashman, he comes across as a Holden Caulfield wannabe who stumbles into a Harry Potter school where there's very little tension.

Without Narnia or Harry Potter, this book wouldn't exist, which says something. Had it been able to stand on its own, it would have been a hell of a book.

I thought a lot of these were the strengths of the book. It's supposed to be Catcher in the Rye meets Harry Potter meets Chronicles of Narnia. It's a deconstruction of the genre and purposefully goes against expectations. You may not jive with the concept or the execution, but it's hard to argue that Grossman didn't accomplish what he set out to achieve.

[Liadin]

Grossman managed to make the prospect of learning magic... not very magical.

You know who the students reminded me of? A group of people I know who went to Carlton College. Very smart. Very lazy. Full of potential, ennui, and angst. Also, annoying as hell after an hour.

This book had potential but didn't live up to it. The protagonist is a selfish coward, but instead of being enjoyable, like say Fraser's Flashman, he comes across as a Holden Caulfield wannabe who stumbles into a Harry Potter school where there's very little tension.

Without Narnia or Harry Potter, this book wouldn't exist, which says something. Had it been able to stand on its own, it would have been a hell of a book.

That's the entire point of the book: that having magic wouldn't solve your problems or make you a better person, and for that matter if magic did exist, it would probably be ridiculously hard work and not much fun most of the time. I'm of two minds about that theme--it seems so obvious after all, and I can't think of many books where magic did just solve all the characters' problems (Harry still had seven books' worth) so Grossman's harping on it may be overkill--but I think that when people complain about this, it's really just because this isn't the sort of book they wanted to read. You wanted more traditional fantasy and you got a deconstruction of the genre's escapist proclivities. That's not a problem with the book, it's a matter of taste.

[Guest Raidne]

Well said. I miss the +1 button. I also feel like this is pretty much what Scot, for instance, said - that he just didn't like it.

[GenlyAi]

The last six posts are redeeming this thread.

Honestly, The Magicians was not at all ingenious in the points it was making, but A) even though they're obvious, they feel fresh to me; B) the overall premise works very well -- maybe you just have to know a lot of people like this; and C) Grossman is quite adept at balancing this "literary" theme with amusing fanservice.

[alguien]

I thought a lot of these were the strengths of the book. It's supposed to be Catcher in the Rye meets Harry Potter meets Chronicles of Narnia. It's a deconstruction of the genre and purposefully goes against expectations. You may not jive with the concept or the execution, but it's hard to argue that Grossman didn't accomplish what he set out to achieve.

Not really. I think if you're going to write a good book that's ______ meets ______, then the book should be able to stand on its own and be enjoyable to one who's never read any of the homage material. The Magician fails at this level.

And I think calling it a deconstruction of the genre gives it WAY too much credit. If its a deconstruction, its execution is very clumsy rather than artful. In fact, I'd go as far to say that one of the reason's the novel fails is that Grossman couldn't decide whether he wanted to write a "gritty" Harry Potter or a deconstruction fantasy satire and produced something in between.