the magicians. lev grossman. (65)

like i mentioned before, i also check out books for grandma bea. grandma bea was running low on books by her favorite authors so i googled "if you liked harry potter, you should check out" to find books for her. (grandma bea is a huge potter fan, she got me into the series) i came across "the magicians" and decided to check it out. my friend saba had read it before and said it was supposed to be harry potter for grown ups. in fact that is what is says on the back cover.

i gave to grandma bea but she didn't like it. i think she read the first 50 pages or so and stopped because she couldn't get into it. even though it lacked her endorsement i decided to give it a chance.

unsurprisingly, i couldn't get into it as well. after 100 pages i wanted to give up. i didn't like quentin, he was too negative and an unlikely hero but not in charming endearing way but in a wow-this-kid-is-a-real-asshole way. he was and is no harry potter. i didn't want to read because i didn't care about him. but i couldn't give up for the following reasons: a) the junto diaz endorsement on the back, i loved "oscar wao" so i respected his opinion and thought that maybe i should wait it out, b) this blog, if i didn't finish it would i be able to blog about it (i decided i could, because occasionally i'll check out a stinker), c) i don't like giving up on books, even if i don't like it, i figure i should finish it so my hatred is at least founded. so i texted my friend juliana (who i saw had read it on good reads) for her opinion on my quitting. she said she loved it. but i should stop. since she loved it, i decided to continue. plus quentin was entering his fourth year and what occurred was cool so i thought it was on the up and up.

i was wrong. due to my already judgy-ness about this book, reading it was like pulling teeth. i wasn't interest in the plot, especially with their post-brakebills lives. don't get me wrong, i would have love to live their bohemian lives but as a magicians they could do so much more. (this was a huge subplot so maybe my restlessness with their lives was what grossman was trying to create?) i absolutely loved the story plot that penny introduced and was excited for what was to come but even that was a letdown. what it boiled down to is that i thought all of the characters were assholes, in addition to being useless. the only character i liked was alice and would have preferred the story from her perspective because she was the only one with integrity. and i get it. grossman was trying to be realistic. the teens and twentysomethings of this generation (and i guess any generation) are jaded, selfish, unmoral, and cowardly. it was hard to become invested in them when i thought they were all pieces of shit. i wish he had characters of better substance, like harry potter, i mean grown up harry potter probably had heart, these kids had nothing. in addition to having bad personalities they were also bad magicians. i admit that if i had to encounter all that they did in their adventure, i would have be unable to utilize my magic skills but these kids sucked. they couldn't do anything, which made their schooling seem pointless. and who wants to read a book about bad magicians? or bad teens? this book is a fantasy, but i still want heroes i can believe it.

but i guess the real problem was that grossman is a bad storyteller. i didn't get lost in his book like i did in the harry potter series. and i know that the first two potters were not all that and since this was the first of the magicians books there was a lot of set up, so i can't have too high of expectations. but those excuses aside it was still bad writing. i felt like i was just reading words on a paper instead of being transported to a different world. even the fighting scenes were a snoozefest. it was kinda like when someone tells a funny story but then they and you realize in order for it to be funny you had to be there. i felt like that while reading "the magicians", i had to be there cos grossman was not a strong enough writer for me get it via his words. i mean chatwin stories in the book seemed a lot more interesting and i kept wish i was reading those instead.

also i hated that this wasn't a book within a book. it would have been better if it was.

i mean with the right director this could be a great movie. the premise was good it was just the writing that was bad and a screenplay adapter can fix that right up. if they do make a movie, i would go see it but read the second book? probably not.

ps though i am an alcoholic, i thought their drinking was excessive. i mean i did my fair share of drinking in college but it was always fun and adventurous. their drinking was boring and sad.