Scan barcode
nimuetheseawitch's review against another edition
5.0
As I read this book, I realized that it was quickly becoming my favorite. I have always loved stories for their journeys, and this book was a Journey that I felt was a part of me.
I found The Night Circus in the most beautiful yet overly modern public library on a very hot day in Sydney, Australia after traveling for what felt like days. Thanks to time zones, it kind of had been. I fell in love with the cover and pages of the book before I even opened it, and as I spent an hour on a couch in a library I couldn't borrow the book from, I fell into the story.
But I had to leave the story. I think I managed to finish it a few months later after sailing through storms and adventure and forgetting it all for a while and coming home. I picked it up from my local library and returned and felt the enchantment again. When I was done, I was disappointed the author hadn't published anything else.
Until this.
This story is everything I could've asked for. It brings together bits and pieces of story tied together with red ribbon and drizzled with honey and is even better than I thought it was going to be after the first few pages. Those first nested stories ensnared me and drew me in and set me up to thinking they could never be reconnected. But they were, and when I thought it couldn't get any better, it did. This story has the right amount of magic and love and death and fate and is queer to it's core. It is my new favorite book, and I look forward to reading it again and again and again.
I found The Night Circus in the most beautiful yet overly modern public library on a very hot day in Sydney, Australia after traveling for what felt like days. Thanks to time zones, it kind of had been. I fell in love with the cover and pages of the book before I even opened it, and as I spent an hour on a couch in a library I couldn't borrow the book from, I fell into the story.
But I had to leave the story. I think I managed to finish it a few months later after sailing through storms and adventure and forgetting it all for a while and coming home. I picked it up from my local library and returned and felt the enchantment again. When I was done, I was disappointed the author hadn't published anything else.
Until this.
This story is everything I could've asked for. It brings together bits and pieces of story tied together with red ribbon and drizzled with honey and is even better than I thought it was going to be after the first few pages. Those first nested stories ensnared me and drew me in and set me up to thinking they could never be reconnected. But they were, and when I thought it couldn't get any better, it did. This story has the right amount of magic and love and death and fate and is queer to it's core. It is my new favorite book, and I look forward to reading it again and again and again.
whimsicalmeerkat's review against another edition
I’ll definitely give it another shot on paper. Audio just isn’t my format.
deckanddaughter's review against another edition
3.0
Much like The Night Circus, I love the visuals and themes invoked in this book. The Alice in Wonderland quality of metaphors, symbols, puzzles, and sugared bites and sips.
But I found the division of stories-upon-stories hard to track and maintain in my brain. And the pacing, much like The Night Circus, was hard to get comfortable with until the latter half.
Zachary Erza Rawlins reminds me a lot of Quentin from The Magicians. He’s all right, not offensive. But all the other characters around him are infinitely more interesting and nuanced. I’d love to get a reading from his mom though. I have some old jewelry perfect for psychometry.
Also, there was a moment towards the end where Zachary asks a cat whether it can talk and the cat is like “No.” and then saunters away and I laughed way too hard because it was 1000% how a cat would reply to such a question
But I found the division of stories-upon-stories hard to track and maintain in my brain. And the pacing, much like The Night Circus, was hard to get comfortable with until the latter half.
Zachary Erza Rawlins reminds me a lot of Quentin from The Magicians. He’s all right, not offensive. But all the other characters around him are infinitely more interesting and nuanced. I’d love to get a reading from his mom though. I have some old jewelry perfect for psychometry.
Also, there was a moment towards the end where Zachary asks a cat whether it can talk and the cat is like “No.” and then saunters away and I laughed way too hard because it was 1000% how a cat would reply to such a question
emggt's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
4.5
Loved it, though the romance felt rushed and didn't feel genuine.
veeiyer's review against another edition
4.0
I only read this book because I had recently read (and LOVED) The Night Circus, so I went in with great expectations (a big mistake) and knowing basically nothing about the book…
When I started the book, I thought this was a collection of short stories that would somehow have something in common that would be revealed as the story goes on.
But we don't even get to the main story till like the second third of the book!
But yes, once the pieces start fitting in together, it's a fun ride. I especially love the character of Zachary Ezra Rawlins is written.
(I'm always gonna say his full name, since it's now imprinted on my brain after reading it so many times!)
When I started the book, I thought this was a collection of short stories that would somehow have something in common that would be revealed as the story goes on.
But we don't even get to the main story till like the second third of the book!
But yes, once the pieces start fitting in together, it's a fun ride. I especially love the character of Zachary Ezra Rawlins is written.
(I'm always gonna say his full name, since it's now imprinted on my brain after reading it so many times!)
moonsunsof's review against another edition
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
the plot was convoluted and i could get down with a convoluted, magical plot if there was something to hold onto with the characters. but sadly they were all so flat and i didn't believe legitimately any of the relationships. i read this before the night circus bc i was like yay gay people but the main relationship has NO chemistry i don't believe a single one of their interactions. the main character is so infuriating, everything just happens to him and he has a neutral reaction every time. a character gets mad at him for "blaming all his problems on fate" instead of taking accountability but he doesnt even do that ?? bc he doesn't even have enough of a personality to have faults and blame other people he just kinda observes and accepts ?? idk this book fucking pissed me off but at least i finished something.
sirrydactyl's review against another edition
5.0
This books contains everything I love, wrapped up in ribbons and time and all things magical.
annekdotes's review
adventurous
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
slow-paced
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.5
This book felt both marvellously original and intensely nostalgic to me, which is a great combination, it turns out. The writing is gorgeous (as I expected based on The Night Circus) and the entire novel is an ode to storytelling. The final 100 pages or so felt a bit more haphazard and hazy, but I did love this story until the end.
ashction's review against another edition
5.0
So... I just finished this book and I'm completely at a loss of what to do with myself now.
I. Adore. This. Book. Like, I kind of feel like someone took my heart and threw it across all these pages in the form of words and said here, this is what is inside you, please accept and enjoy and cherish it. There's so much here that is wonderful for me - the impossibleness of the worlds below the world, the quiet mystery that tumbles into the end of an epic, the characters who quickly root into you heart as only the best characters know how to do.
There's just so much here that works. I'm sure there are people who think some things don't work, but I'd be hard-pressed to find a single thing to complain about. I loved the diversity of the characters, the ebb and flow of Morgenstern's prose, the simplicity somehow elegant when mixed in with odd fantasy. I think that's the only way to describe this book, genre-wise. It falls somewhere between magical realism and odd fantasy, a balance of just the right amount of quirk and wonder with reality.
The best part of this book, however, is reading each shorter story or tale and watching as it links and coincides with the main story. The experience of reading The Starless Sea is so incredibly meta that it brought out the English major tendencies I haven't yet forgotten; I was tempted to underline and circle and note in the margins all the connections as they were made. The book itself is a commentary on storytelling and books as much as it is an actual story, which I think is what makes it so fun and also what makes it a book I want to go back to again and again. And what's so wonderful is the book teeters on the line of a story being told and of pure fate; you never know exactly which is true, or if both are true, or if neither really applies at all. The book tells you as much in the end; it informs Zachary that the storyteller is Fate, and Fate the storyteller.
That being said, this book isn't just some charming fantasy romp. It's serious, and thoughtful, and - at times - positively devastating. The amount of work that went into crafting a book like this must have been daunting and time-consuming. This book feels like art as much as it feels like a part of me, something I've just been waiting to come into existence.
I can't wait to buy this book. (I'll be buying both the US and UK editions, I think, because how can one not have both. They're so gorgeous.) I can't wait to reread this book again someday. And I hope that everyone who gets to read this book, for the first time, enjoy it in their own way as much as I have.
P.S. This may be a bit of a spoilery note, but I find it funny how, when I was first reading the book, I told my friends that it read like honey - slow, sweet, dripping - only to discover the Starless Sea is made of honey itself! There's so many subtle things I thought to myself while reading that further played into my experience of the book between a story or fate or something altogether different.
I. Adore. This. Book. Like, I kind of feel like someone took my heart and threw it across all these pages in the form of words and said here, this is what is inside you, please accept and enjoy and cherish it. There's so much here that is wonderful for me - the impossibleness of the worlds below the world, the quiet mystery that tumbles into the end of an epic, the characters who quickly root into you heart as only the best characters know how to do.
There's just so much here that works. I'm sure there are people who think some things don't work, but I'd be hard-pressed to find a single thing to complain about. I loved the diversity of the characters, the ebb and flow of Morgenstern's prose, the simplicity somehow elegant when mixed in with odd fantasy. I think that's the only way to describe this book, genre-wise. It falls somewhere between magical realism and odd fantasy, a balance of just the right amount of quirk and wonder with reality.
The best part of this book, however, is reading each shorter story or tale and watching as it links and coincides with the main story. The experience of reading The Starless Sea is so incredibly meta that it brought out the English major tendencies I haven't yet forgotten; I was tempted to underline and circle and note in the margins all the connections as they were made. The book itself is a commentary on storytelling and books as much as it is an actual story, which I think is what makes it so fun and also what makes it a book I want to go back to again and again. And what's so wonderful is the book teeters on the line of a story being told and of pure fate; you never know exactly which is true, or if both are true, or if neither really applies at all. The book tells you as much in the end; it informs Zachary that the storyteller is Fate, and Fate the storyteller.
That being said, this book isn't just some charming fantasy romp. It's serious, and thoughtful, and - at times - positively devastating. The amount of work that went into crafting a book like this must have been daunting and time-consuming. This book feels like art as much as it feels like a part of me, something I've just been waiting to come into existence.
I can't wait to buy this book. (I'll be buying both the US and UK editions, I think, because how can one not have both. They're so gorgeous.) I can't wait to reread this book again someday. And I hope that everyone who gets to read this book, for the first time, enjoy it in their own way as much as I have.
P.S. This may be a bit of a spoilery note, but I find it funny how, when I was first reading the book, I told my friends that it read like honey - slow, sweet, dripping - only to discover the Starless Sea is made of honey itself! There's so many subtle things I thought to myself while reading that further played into my experience of the book between a story or fate or something altogether different.