The Magicians
School fantasy is often aimed at children, and it's very successful at hitting that market. It's much harder to appeal exclusively to adults, and that's where The Magicians shines. Rather than the typical twelve-year-old protagonist, it tells the story of a high-school student not yet aware of his powers. Quentin Coldwater is obsessed with fantasy books, an outcast, and somewhat depressed. When given the opportunity to study magic, he jumps on it, but quickly learns it’s not as fun as it seems. In The Magicians, spells are hard. Learning magic is tedious and requires background knowledge of language and history. Quentin finds himself frustrated at his progress, no longer the prodigy he used to be. From there, the book only gets darker. The antagonist has no mercy, magic can kill simply through accidents, and drug use is rife. Lev Grossman stands in stark defiance of convention, refusing to sugar-coat magic and creates a tense and compelling story as a result.
Books in The Magicians Series (2)
Similar Recommendations
You might want to give Susan Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell a read. Like Lev Grossman's The Magicians, it's a story about magic in a world that supposedly has no magic. Both novels veer from the usual fantasy conventions, weighing in as more than just "fantasy." I like to call these "literary fantasy." This novel, however, heralds back to the Victorian era and features a more conventional sort of story (that borrows heavily from the likes of a Jane Austen novel in language an description) and is NOT a postmodern take on the fantasy genre that The Magicians is.
For another novel about Magicians in training, you might like The Night Circus. It's about two young magicians locked in deadly conflict trying to outperform the other who are both part of a magical circus. It's a rich and intoxicating read, most decidedly literary and one of the best fantasy books of 2011.
Harry Potter. Yes, if you like The Magicians, read Harry Potter the titular character who is deconstructed by Grossman and reformed into a far more complex and troubled and fallible version as the character Quinton.
If we are going to follow that rabbit down the rabbit hole into the dark and murky literary past, seeking the origin of boy-goes-to-magic school to become a wizard, we might as well get to one of the sources. If Potter made it a pop culture thing, then Ursula Le Guine helped bring it alive like no other author. Yes, I'm talking about The Wizard of Earthsea. Before there was Harry Potter, there was Ged.
Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaimen. One thing I love about The Magicians is it moves the simpler children's fiction into the adult realm with an adult perspective. It's Narnia for grown-ups.One book about that perfectly captures the child realm but transforms it for adults is Gaimen's Ocean at the End of the Lane. Thematically, Gaimen does the same thing as Grossman. While both works are completely different in scope and plot, they do take a child's perspective but remake it for an adult which changes it.
The Secret History by Donna Tart. Not specifically fantasy per say, but the writing and tone, and characterization are somewhat similar. A young group of students at a college discover another way to think about their life and the ramifications of this change everything about how they live.
Anathem by Neal Stephenson. A science fiction story about a young boy who's a sort of monk and finds out the wider world is a complicated place.
The Magicians alludes to a number of popular fantasy classics. Alice in Wonderland is one such work and The Chronicles of Narnia. In fact, if you dig down a bit, The Magican books are a postmodern version of Narnia with the friendly animals revealed to be monsters.
Booklists having this book
Top 25 Best Fantasy Books Since 2010
Sometimes you don't want to wade through older books when picking out your next selection of best fantasy to read. As impacting and awesome as some of the older 'greats'... Read more
Best Urban Fantasy Books
This is perhaps one of the more difficult sub-genres to place books in simply because it’s so open-ended in terms of what can be included. The one quintessential element of... Read more
Best Magic School Fantasy Books
There are thousands of fantasy settings. Entirely different universes, alternate histories, and different realities. However, where magic is concerned, education is always vital, and that makes for some hugely satisfying... Read more
Top 50 Best Coming of Age Fantasy Books
Coming of age stories are one of the oldest themes in fiction, providing a sense of progression and growth that can't be rivaled. This is a theme that's as old... Read more
Top 25 Best Fantasy Books
This is a list of books that are the crème de la crème of the fantasy genre. I've carefully chosen the top 25 fantasy books from hundreds of series and... Read more
Best Literary Fantasy Books
If you're tired of those same old boy villager finds magic sword / talisman / super power, meets a company of sidekicks (with the requisite princess in disguise and old... Read more
Fantasy Books That Will Blow Your Mind
Occasionally, there are books that blow your mind; books that once you read, you never ever forget. Perhaps it’s because the startling new ideas in the book find fertile ground in... Read more
Top 50 Best Epic Fantasy
Epic fantasy is arguably the father of all fantasy subgenres. It's also the most popular fantasy genre, with hordes of new epic fantasy books being released each month. Unfortunately, the... Read more
Best Fantasy Series
Do you love those fantasy novels with many kingdoms, protagonists, politics, and cultures? Do you like the epic struggles between small bands of heroes against impossible evil? Do you eagerly... Read more
Other books by Grossman, Lev
The Magicians
School fantasy is often aimed at children, and it's very successful at hitting that market. It's much harder to appeal exclusively to adults, and that's where The Magicians shines. Rather... Read more
The Magician King
The Magician's Land
Magician's Land
When The Magicians (the first in the trilogy) was released a few years ago, it received wide critical acclaim from magazines, newspapers and high-brow critics, but was (somewhat) panned by... Read more
The Magicians
The Magicians trilogy is a series that's been critically acclaimed and rates very high on our own Top 25 Best Fantasy Books list. It's a trilogy that's perhaps divisive --... Read more
The Magicians
When publishers significantly alter source material, bad things tend to happen. You only have to look at the whitewashed Earthsea to see how poorly it can go, but occasionally directors... Read more
News
The Dark Is Rising Sequence
One of the best YA epic fantasy series. Well-developed characters that are stereotypical but still exhibit a surprising amount of depth. A standard save-the-world plot, but one that still evokes...
Glow (The Plated Prisoner Series Book 4)
The Booktok hit: The Plated Prisoner Series continues in book 4. This dark adult fantasy romance is inspired by the myth of King Midas and the gold-touched woman who realizes...
