The Magician’s Land is the conclusion to the Magicians Trilogy by Lev Grossman (soon to be seen on Syfy as a TV show). If you missed it, you should check out my reviews of book 1: The Magicians and book 2: The Magician King. Beware of Spoilers ahead!
“Cast out of Fillory, Quentin Coldwater returns to the place his story began, the Brakebills Preparatory College of Magic. All too soon, however, his past comes looking for him, and Quentin sets out to face his fears and put things right—or die trying. Filled with riveting battle scenes as well as intriguing new characters and the return of beloved favorites, The Magician’s Land brings Grossman’s epic tale to its magnificent conclusion.”
(source: Goodreads)
Grossman broke a little with tradition on this one and didn’t split it into four parts. I kind of missed it, but the flow was still pretty nice. It still switched between POVs though, namely the one of Quentin, the people in Fillory and new addition Plum. Also, there were a couple of chapters that were a story within the story and I quite enjoyed how everything just seemed to come together in the end. It was one of those everything and everyone is connected in some way.
So, Quentin really grew into himself and by now I actually cared about him and even liked him, which was just extremely difficult in the beginning. I am so glad he finally did get his Discipline, even though Minor Mendings seems pretty underwhelming at first. I love that they brought back Alice and that she and Q didn’t just go back to how everything was before – they actually have to start over which seems realistic after what they went through. A lot of the characters are still pretty crazy (especially Janet), but not everything is doom and gloom like it was in the Magicians. In hindsight, I have the feeling that the first book is not the best representation of the series and with its weird pacing and mood it probably put off a lot of readers from continuing with the trilogy.
It wouldn’t be the same if I didn’t show you the map of this book as well (unfortunately I didn’t find it coloured anywhere like the others were):
Fazit: 3.7/5 stars. It was funny and a great conclusion to the series. However, I am still not sure I would want to revisit it because it’s not one of my favourites.
In the end, my personal ranking of the books would be as followed:
- The Magician King
- The Magician’s Land
- The Magicians
Another book to scratch off my September TBR. What are your thoughts? Have you read the series as well?
I can’t believe that you’ve already finished it 😀
overall, were you expecting it to be better?
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I think I expected more, but I can’t exactly put into words what it is I expected. I mean the series was fine, but just not that overwhelmingly good. Do you know what I mean?
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yeah, I do =/ maybe it’s because of how it’s sold… =/
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probably … I mean it really doesn’t have much in common with Harry Potter (even though I haven’t read the books) but it is a sort of dark Narnia. Then again, I didn’t enjoy the Narnia books all that much.
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=/ well, hopefully you’ll enjoy your next read more 🙂
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It wasn’t that terrible, just not that great either 😉
I’m currently on Frankenstein, which surprised me by starting out in form of a letter. So far so good, but I don’t know how long it’ll take.
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as long as you’re enjoying it 😉
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