The Night Circus- Erin Morgenstern

A busy week means I am late posting about this book- something I wanted to do as soon as I put it down last weekend. I find that everything is a bit stop and start at the moment, so when I have time to read something 'just for fun'- and I enjoy it as much as I did this book- I tear through it in one sitting. Reading in this particularly feverish way was wonderful when digging into The Night Circus.
A beautiful, dark, sprawling fairytale, The Night Circus is the story of a magical black and white circus that appears, without warning, and only at night. While the people who visit the circus are stunned by the intricate, breathtaking acts and scenes they come across they do not realise that the most obvious explanation for what they see is the truth of it. The circus is magic. And not just magic, but the venue chosen for a game of skill a lifetime in the making.
The premise of the book is interesting, but I did feel that the plot had unravelled slightly by the end, as if it needed to be wrapped up quickly- which was especially jarring as for most of the book the story unfolds quite gently. The book's late nineteenth century setting also felt, at times, like something of an after thought. That being said this book's real strength is in its incredible visual quality. While I would never call it a children's book it awoke in me the same sense of excitement and intense imaginative experience that I associate with reading as a child. The descriptions of the circus are wonderful and really play into this feeling of childlike abandon. Les Cirques des Reves is just that, an escape to a space full of living dreams, and it is this feeling of a dream that the slow burning pace of the novel respects. This is not a fast paced work of fantasy, and while the novel is built around a duel, it is a duel between artists attempting to create the most perfect of dreamscapes.
Given that the book is so intensely visual I am not surprised that the film rights to it have already been sold- there is a wealth of beautiful material here. Some of it too beautiful, I think, to be translated to the screen. I attach the book trailer because- although I dislike them in general- here I think it provides a nice mood piece which may give you a better idea of what you're getting into than all my hazy thoughts. Simply, I think you should read it. A lovely book.