![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
missroseroseAtmosphere is a tricky thing to pull off in a novel. Done well, it can make a book memorable, give it a depth and a life of its own outside the current story being told. But it's a tricky balance to strike - nearly every word devoted to atmosphere and worldbuilding is a word that's not furthering the story, and it's incredibly easy for an author to get so bogged down that they seem to forget about the plot entirely. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, to which I've seen this book compared, is a textbook example of this problem: fantastic atmosphere, all sorts of fun with tone and worldbuilding, and almost no actual discernible plot.
Fortunately, and perhaps appropriately given the subject matter, The Night Circus does a much better job at its balancing act. The pacing could definitely be called "deliberate", but there's so many fantastic things to see along the way that you generally don't mind the length of the journey, even as the sinister elements slowly grow. I picked this up in an airport bookstore prior to a long flight, and highly recommend it for situations of similar boredom and mild discomfort; this story is immersive on a level many aim for but few achieve.
The trickiest part of any such story, however, is the payoff - the author spends so much time creating and strengthening this sense of wonder and dread, to the point where the reader feels cheated if the ending doesn't have a high-stakes feeling worthy of the buildup. And while The Night Circus' ending works well enough, it...doesn't quite meet that standard. Perhaps it's that the structure of the story sets one up for a great tragedy, and the ending, while not quite happy, is far from tragic. Perhaps it's simply a sense of inevitability, of elements meshing together like a finely-constructed watch, that robs the reader of any real doubt as to how things will resolve. Regardless, it was a slight disappointment after such a stellar journey. Not a huge letdown, just slightly anticlimactic, like an airport dinner after three days of Chicago restaurants.
Still, if you enjoy the journey as much as the destination, and want to lose yourself in a beautifully constructed and very particular fantasy, I strongly recommend this one.
Fortunately, and perhaps appropriately given the subject matter, The Night Circus does a much better job at its balancing act. The pacing could definitely be called "deliberate", but there's so many fantastic things to see along the way that you generally don't mind the length of the journey, even as the sinister elements slowly grow. I picked this up in an airport bookstore prior to a long flight, and highly recommend it for situations of similar boredom and mild discomfort; this story is immersive on a level many aim for but few achieve.
The trickiest part of any such story, however, is the payoff - the author spends so much time creating and strengthening this sense of wonder and dread, to the point where the reader feels cheated if the ending doesn't have a high-stakes feeling worthy of the buildup. And while The Night Circus' ending works well enough, it...doesn't quite meet that standard. Perhaps it's that the structure of the story sets one up for a great tragedy, and the ending, while not quite happy, is far from tragic. Perhaps it's simply a sense of inevitability, of elements meshing together like a finely-constructed watch, that robs the reader of any real doubt as to how things will resolve. Regardless, it was a slight disappointment after such a stellar journey. Not a huge letdown, just slightly anticlimactic, like an airport dinner after three days of Chicago restaurants.
Still, if you enjoy the journey as much as the destination, and want to lose yourself in a beautifully constructed and very particular fantasy, I strongly recommend this one.
