The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern

Once in a while you find a book that is just filled with magic and wonder that it pains you to see the harsh reality around your own world.  How you wish that such fictional things were not just dreams on a page and that they could really be.  One such book that I found recently is “The Night Circus” by Erin Morgenstern.  This book got me right from the moment I first saw it at the bookstore – black and white and red, all glamour, mystery, and magic.  If ever I’d be crazy enough to try to put together a list of books I most love (an impossible, unthinkable endeavor), this book will definitely be somewhere near the top of that list. 

From www.erinmorgenstern.com comes this description:

The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called Le Cirque des Rêves, and it is only open at night.

But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.

True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus per­formers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.

I don’t even know where to begin describing the experience of reading this book.  I am no literary critic; I can only try to put into words how it felt like for me to experience a piece of literature.  When I started reading this book, I just felt like I was already there – like I fell into the world by accident and didn’t even feel the wind of the passage.  And throughout the reading I felt such longing for the circus to be true, to really exist even if I could never go there myself.  It almost doesn’t matter that I’ll never enter any of the tents, or see the bonfire, or witness the performances.  Just having it all be real would be enough. 

I fell in love with all the characters – every single one of them, from the proprietors to the ticket sellers.  How I wished I could actually see their performances in the tents or on the grounds as people walked around.  I empathized with their fears, dismays, curiosities, joys, and triumphs.  And central to it all is the astounding magical dynamic between Marco and Celia.  Throughout the entire story I desperately hoped that they’ll find happiness and overcome all difficulties, for there were times in the story when I felt that not even all the magic they have between them could possibly save them.

The author was able to create such a magical world – I could practically see the bonfire and smell the caramel.  What an amazing imagination, to have produced something like this.  It does remind me of a couple of other books.  One is “Something Wicked This Way Comes” by Ray Bradbury, and another is “The Prestige” by Christopher Priest – both of which are just as well worth reading.  It has been a long time since any book has elicited such an emotional response from me.  I do wish more and more people will read “The Night Circus” and experience its magic, too.