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Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell by Sussanah Clarke Book Review

 Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell 

by Sussanah Clarke 


Rating 5/5 😀😀😀

Just finished the book and my head is spinning. What a eerie and strange story. Deeply unsettling and thoroughly seeped in  magic! How wonderful is this book with such good prose. There is not a bit of boredom or languishing in the narrative which unapologetically plodded along painting a tale transporting me to a distant place and time. A time and place where the happenings of the day have no logical explanation than being perpetuated by magic which only two magicians in England could have understood. Yes! They are the two titular characters - Jonathan Strange and Mr.Norell. 

Mr. Norell destroys the chance of every other English man from learning and practicing magic. He is a bit of a negative character who wants to revive and bring back old glory to practical magic but wants to be the one doing it. His sources of magic are the books in his library which he has gone to great pains and ordeals to procure. He is quite jealous and possessive of them - not letting others even have a peak at their titles. Jonathan Strange comes into the profession of magic for a lack of any other occupation and becomes student to Mr.Norell upon application. He later becomes more of an independent practitioner and breaks away from Norell and his theories. He is such a strange person who devises to go mad in order to communicate and collaborate with fairies. His actions are what have left me quite speechless and the magic in this book is extraordinary. I have not read a book like this one before. How could such a story and the magic in it be conceived by a normal mind? Quite spectacular indeed! 


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