Book Review
So I just finished The Magicians by Grossman. I felt enormously dissatisfied when I closed the book. Don't get me wrong. There are some fabulous things about the book. The way magic works is incredibly detailed and fascinating. Several of the characters are deeply worth caring about. Emotions and a sense of reality in spite of the supernatural goings on are captured quite well. I read the whole thing yesterday because I didn't want to put the book down.
However I felt let down with the ending. I am going to try to explain why without being too spoilery in case one of the few people seeing this might want to read the novel. The main character never really seems to come to terms with quite a few problems that have been spelled out for him in painful detail. There are a couple of plot devices that were dangled in front of the reader that are never resolved. I would say this meant sequel except that the items in question are small and I'm just not sure that the author didn't simply leave them hanging by accident. There is also one bit of background tossed in off-handedly that I feel was entirely unnecessary and that makes one character too pat.
*sigh* All in all, I'm just not sure I'd recommend this title. It has good points but it ended in such an unfulfilling manner that I felt the need to write about it here. I didn't dislike the book and others may whole-heartedly disagree with me on how they view it but I just don't think that it's a keeper.
However I felt let down with the ending. I am going to try to explain why without being too spoilery in case one of the few people seeing this might want to read the novel. The main character never really seems to come to terms with quite a few problems that have been spelled out for him in painful detail. There are a couple of plot devices that were dangled in front of the reader that are never resolved. I would say this meant sequel except that the items in question are small and I'm just not sure that the author didn't simply leave them hanging by accident. There is also one bit of background tossed in off-handedly that I feel was entirely unnecessary and that makes one character too pat.
*sigh* All in all, I'm just not sure I'd recommend this title. It has good points but it ended in such an unfulfilling manner that I felt the need to write about it here. I didn't dislike the book and others may whole-heartedly disagree with me on how they view it but I just don't think that it's a keeper.