The Night Circus

Starred review from May 16, 2011
Debut author Morgenstern doesn't miss a beat in this smashing tale of greed, fate, and love set in a turn of the 20th-century circus. Celia is a five-year-old with untrained psychokinetic powers when she is unceremoniously dumped on her unsuspecting father, Hector Bowen, better known as Le Cirque des Reves' Prospero the Entertainer. Hector immediately hatches a sinister scheme for Celia: pit her against a rival's young magician in an epic battle of magic that will, by design, result in the death of one of the players, though neither Celia nor her adversary, Marco, is informed of the inevitable outcome. What neither Hector nor his rival count on is that Celia and Marco will eventually fall in love. Their mentorsâMarco's mentor, Alexander, plucked him from the London streets due to his psychic abilitiesâattempt to intervene with little success as Celia and Marco barrel toward an unexpected and oddly fitting conclusion. Supporting charactersâsuch as Bailey, a farm boy who befriends a set of twins born into the circus who will drastically influence his future; Isobel, a circus employee and onetime girlfriend of Marco's; and theatrical producer Chandresh Christophe Lefèvreâare perfectly realized and live easily in a giant, magical story destined for bestsellerdom. This is an electric debut on par with Special Topics in Calamity Physics.

Starred review from April 15, 2011

Self-assured, entertaining debut novel that blends genres and crosses continents in quest of magic.

The world's not big enough for two wizards, as Tolkien taught us—even if that world is the shiny, modern one of the late 19th century, with its streetcars and electric lights and newfangled horseless carriages. Yet, as first-time novelist Morgenstern imagines it, two wizards there are, if likely possessed of more legerdemain than true conjuring powers, and these two are jealous of their turf. It stands to reason, the laws of the universe working thus, that their children would meet and, rather than continue the feud into a new generation, would instead fall in love. Call it Romeo and Juliet for the Gilded Age, save that Morgenstern has her eye on a different Shakespearean text, The Tempest; says a fellow called Prospero to young magician Celia of the name her mother gave her, "She should have named you Miranda...I suppose she was not clever enough to think of it." Celia is clever, however, a born magician, and eventually a big hit at the Circus of Dreams, which operates, naturally, only at night and has a slightly sinister air about it. But what would you expect of a yarn one of whose chief setting-things-into-action characters is known as "the man in the grey suit"? Morgenstern treads into Harry Potter territory, but though the chief audience for both Rowling and this tale will probably comprise of teenage girls, there are only superficial genre similarities. True, Celia's magical powers grow, and the ordinary presto-change-o stuff gains potency—and, happily, surrealistic value. Finally, though, all the magic has deadly consequence, and it is then that the tale begins to take on the contours of a dark thriller, all told in a confident voice that is often quite poetic, as when the man in the grey suit tells us, "There's magic in that. It's in the listener, and for each and every ear it will be different, and it will affect them in ways they can never predict."

Generous in its vision and fun to read. Likely to be a big book—and, soon, a big movie, with all the franchise trimmings.

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

April 1, 2011

When Prospero the Enchanter discovers that he has a young daughter with extraordinary magical talents, he wastes no time in setting up a competition between her and the protege of his longtime adversary. Celia and Marco train until young adulthood and eventually meet under the eerie black-and-white-striped tents of the Cirque des Reves--the Circus of Dreams. What happens next has obviously intrigued a lot of people--rights for this debut have been sold to 22 countries, Summit Entertainment has made a film deal, and there's a 175,000-copy first printing. Not over-the-top kaleidoscopic but keenly, lushly cool and inventive with a hint of danger and reckless love; remember, this circus "Opens at Nightfall/ Closes at Dawn." Puts me in mind of Ray Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes lightened up by Harry Potter. This will be big.

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from May 15, 2011
This big andno, not bulkycompelling first novel ushers in a menacing tone with its first sentence: The circus arrives without warning. Why would a circus arrive so quietly in town, and why would anyone need warning about this particular one? The time span here is 30 years, from 1873 to 1903, and the settings range from America to Europe. To a famous magician is delivered a little girl who, as it turns out, is his child, and fortunately for his future, she is possessed of magical powers. As it also happens, this magician has an archrival, who, in the face of the first magicians jackpot in the form of his little girl, seeks a young person for him to train to rival her. What the two magicians did not anticipate, as the years pass and the two young people, the girl and the boy whom the second magician found, are honed in their specialty for performances sake and to outplay the other one, is that the young persons, when of an age, would meet and, surprising or not to the reader, fall in love. How will their destiny play out now? With appeal for readers not particularly geared to fantasy but who plainly enjoy an unusual and well-drawn story, this one will make a good crossover suggestion.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)