![]() Jonathan Strange becomes his apprentice and then, because the government finds him easier to get along with than Norrell, goes to the continent to assist English troops in the fight against Napoleon. The mysterious, private and eccentric Gilbert Norrell jealously guards his rare and unique volumes of magic, secretly plotting to bring it back to England. Set in an alternate England during the Napoleonic wars where magic is, or was, real, but is now passing into academia and myth, a relic of a golden age now passed. Of course, everything looks different in retrospect, and I wish that I hadn’t waited quite so long to enjoy the masterpiece that is Jonathan Strange & Mr. Nearly ten years after publication, I finally cracked it, and I can’t figure out why I waited so long. ![]() Sitting on my shelf for well over half a decade, thick black and heavy, there was something oppressive about the cover that kept me away. ![]()
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