A-Z Wednesday (J)


A-Z WEDNESDAY
A-Z Wednesday is hosted by Vicky of Reading at the Beach
To join, here's all you have to do: Go to your stack of books and find one whose title starts with the letter of the week.
Post:
1~ a photo of the book
2~ title and synopsis
3~ link(amazon, barnes and noble etc.).
Be sure to visit other participants to see what book they have posted and leave them a comment. (We all love comments, don't we?) Who knows? You may find your next "favorite" book.

THIS WEEK'S LETTER IS: J
Here is my “J” Title:

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrel – Susanna Clarke
800 pages; published 2004
From Publishers Weekly
The drawing room social comedies of early 19th-century Britain are infused with the powerful forces of English folklore and fantasy in this extraordinary novel of two magicians who attempt to restore English magic in the age of Napoleon. In Clarke's world, gentlemen scholars pore over the magical history of England, which is dominated by the Raven King, a human who mastered magic from the lands of faerie. The study is purely theoretical until Mr. Norrell, a reclusive, mistrustful bookworm, reveals that he is capable of producing magic and becomes the toast of London society, while an impetuous young aristocrat named Jonathan Strange tumbles into the practice, too, and finds himself quickly mastering it. Though irritated by the reticent Norrell, Strange becomes the magician's first pupil, and the British government is soon using their skills. Mr. Strange serves under Wellington in the Napoleonic Wars (in a series of wonderful historical scenes), but afterward the younger magician finds himself unable to accept Norrell's restrictive views of magic's proper place and sets out to create a new age of magic by himself. Clarke manages to portray magic as both a believably complex and tedious labor, and an eerie world of signs and wonders where every object may have secret meaning. London politics and talking stones are portrayed with equal realism and seem indisputably part of the same England, as signs indicate that the Raven King may return. The chock-full, old-fashioned narrative (supplemented with deft footnotes to fill in the ignorant reader on incidents in magical history) may seem a bit stiff and mannered at first, but immersion in the mesmerizing story reveals its intimacy, humor and insight, and will enchant readers of fantasy and literary fiction alike.  (Amazon)

6 comments :

Trisha said...

This book has been on my TBR list for quite some time. Even now I can see it staring at me forlornly from my bookshelf. Have you read it yet? I'm assuming that the entire synopsis came from Amazon.

gautami tripathy said...

I gotta read it!

A-Z Wednesday: Just Say Yes by Betina Krahn

Bryan R. Terry said...

I considered using this one, but you beat me to it! This has been on my TBR list for a long time, and I think I'm going to make it my next audiobook.

My J Book is HERE

Anonymous said...

This has been on my list forever. I need to pick it up, so then it'll be staring at me from the shelf, one step closer to being read.

Ladytink_534 said...

I read that! That book is huge with extensive footnotes!

Jenny Girl said...

Oh girl! I could not finish this book. Ladytink is correct about the footnotes. Very distracting too.