Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Since the time it was published back in 2005, I’ve been hearing good things about Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.  I bought the book last year at a used bookstore, but only recently got around to diving into the 800 pages.

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is the story of the return of magic to England during the Napoleonic Wars. During this time “theoretical magic” is a gentlemanly study that mostly involves reading a writing about magicians of the golden age of magic several hundred years before.  This all changes when Mr Norrell, who can actually do magic (”a practical magician”) offers his services to the British government to help with the war effort and the cause of returning English magic to greatness.

Norrell is a stuffy little man who believes he is the only one qualified to bring  back magic to England as well as the only one to direct it.  During this time Jonathan Strange discovers that he can do magic and moves to London to learn under Norrell.  The conflict between Strange and Norrell, as well as the repercussions from  one of the earlier acts of his magic dominate the rest of the book.

I was of two minds about this book.  The voice of the narration was suppose to model the time it was happening and at times it was funny.  Other times it was just  grating.  I didn’t really find many of the characters likable or even that interesting.  The pacing is slow and until the last third of the book didn’t really grab my attention.  That being said, the last third of the book I found very enjoyable.  But after I had finished, I questioned if wading through 600 pages previously was worth it.  The “amazing” type reviews  that the book got seemed to miss the mark (at least in my opinion).