Review: The Night Circus

 

Okay, let me be clear about this. Being the dumbfuck that I am, I actually read the other book first without reading this one. The Glass Hotel had already scarred me and I was so damn sure I was gonna end up emotionally scarred. Bruh, I'm emotionally fucked.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern follows the story of Celia and Marco, who are pitted against one another in a competition by their mentors and they are required to showcase their performances in a circus that stays open only during the night. They're supposed to outdo the other until one of them gives out, but what happens when feelings get involved in this mess? There's no way out of it, because only one is supposed to stay in this competition.

QUICK THOUGHTS AND REVIEW: 3.9/5, I'd give it a four star but at some point I went like eh?

PROS:

1. Narration: The narration is definitely one of the types that I haven't seen before. At least not in excellent books. In the books that aren't good perhaps, maybe they had that style of narration. The book goes on in present continuous tense, which is by far the worst tense one can use for a book, but somehow Erin Morgenstern makes it work, and she makes it work splendidly. It narrates the actions and yet somehow it maintains the same air of mystery as any other book. 

2. Plot and setting: I mean, I loved the concept of "the circus of dreams". The timeline isn't really certain as such, but I think it would be around 70s to 80s ish? Even 90s but I don't think it would be that old. And if I am gonna be honest, I loooooooooove circuses, they're really entertaining (though I haven't been to one since 2015? Eh I really don't remember, faulty memory you see). And the members of the circus, I had to look up half the terms I didn't know.

3.  It just had a grey-ish vibe around it which made it really likeable? I mean, there aren't any points which are easy to point out, because this book was like one big morally grey unsocial man whom you can't help but enjoy and love.

CONS:

1. Character: One dimensional. Flat. Confusing. There is seriously nothing to add to the folks in there that makes these characters come alive. I didn't want them to exist in real life as I do with most of the characters I love. It didn't seem like that. They seemed like, they won't survive the real world if they came out like this, they just wouldn't survive.

2. Development: Bland, to put it gently. I mean, I can understand the developments that happen throughout the book, but they happen too fast, but they're connected only by a flimsy thread that can only been seen if you observed properly. And the development between Marco and Celia? I didn't see anything happen between them and yet you see them falling in love with one another? Just, no.

OVERALL, AN OKAY READ, I'd have loved to see more of it though.