Here's Megan's review of The Magicians. I'll post my review of The Magician King very soon. But it was this review that made read Lev Grossman in the first place.
A young man walking with his friends performs a coin trick inside his pocket where nobody can see it. And there it is: a brilliant, perfect introduction to Quentin Coldwater, who is a genius, unhappy, and about to discover that magic is absolutely real, just hidden where most people can’t see it.
The bones of the story might be familiar: a boy discovers that he has a talent for magic and goes off to boarding school to learn it. He makes friends and discovers a magical world straight from his beloved books. The details though (and the book is crammed with details, strange and extravagant, disturbing and scary ones) make this book fresh and thoroughly grown up. As this intelligent story races past enchanted buttons and evil beasts, alcohol drenched parties and caustic affairs, it ends up describing how difficult it is to grow up, and how it’s sometimes wonderful and sometimes painful to long for the extraordinary to appear.
