The Night Circus

“The truest tales require time and familiarity to become what they are.”

You wake up and go about your routine as always; unsuspecting of anything as always. You step outside to buy groceries and are barely two blocks away from your house when you see it. The Night Circus. “The circus always arrives without warning”, ensnaring every inhabitant; a vision of black and white. This beauty of the night has its fair share of secrets too. When you step inside the circus, you don't have an inkling that it just might be a venue for two souls to play their cards in some subtle but essential way— no… the sheer magnificence of the world inside the circus leaves you speechless, drives away all your other thoughts until the only thing you can focus on is the striking chaos of the circus. 

Hands down, this is my favorite read of this year. I don't think I will be able to think of anything but this book for a while whenever someone says 'favorite book'. The Night Circus drowned me completely in its world and left me wishing for some more chapters to miraculously appear at the end. Every page I turned kept me hooked; the brilliance of the writing, the plot, and the characters were very vivid to me. It was a silent afternoon when I was moving towards the climax. The anticipation in me steadily rose; my heart hammering against my chest, in tandem with the tick stock of the clock in my living room. 

I am not going to provide any more information about the plot/storyline because I want you to blindly dive into it. That's exactly what I did and it was nothing like I expected. It was beyond anything of my assumptions. 

The point of view and the timeline kept changing in each chapter. I admit that it caused me confusion at first. However, as I moved through the book, I managed to notice a pattern in the fickle POVs. I kept the pattern in my mind which made it far easier to comprehend everything.

I loved the excerpts written in the second person narration and was eager for it till the end. The narration honestly made me feel as if I was inside the circus myself. 

I had so many questions bubbling in me at the start, though they all settled down in time. Every character was fascinating in their way. The author has given outlines to all of them— some clear, some vague. Though, all had a certain dept to them– enough for you to empathize with them, not enough for them to be predictable. Especially Widge. He was a light-hearted character in the book yet still managed to surprise me at the end. He's a foodie, chill all the time, and obsessed with reading— Widge is my spirit animal. 

Bailey and Poppet were adorable, they warmed my heart. 

One thing that I caught immediately was how the author did good in her description of Chandresh being obsessive. 

He, along with Isobel and Tara was the characters I pitied. Shock and pity at Tara's fate, pity in the case of Chandresh and Isobel— another common ground being indignant on their behalf, for they all were affected by the "game" started by Alexander and Hector.

I have only one thing to say about Hector– he was a pest while alive, he was a pest while "dead". At least Alexander was a bit tolerable. 

The most tragic of them all have to be Celia and Marco. I loved how it was all intricately connected to them, it made the book all the more exciting to read. Celia and Theissen's friendship was beautiful and my heart hurt that there just wasn't enough time for them. 

It was deliciously curious to read about both Celia and Marco's every work. Was it all magic, lighting a spark in them, or was it all a sleight of hand, expertise in their fingertips? I do not know the answer to this and frankly many other questions but I am not sure I want to know. After all—

“I prefer to remain unenlightened, to better appreciate the dark.”

The beautiful quotes were also one of my favorite parts of the story. They were all so carefully (and beautifully) worded and made one thoughtful. 

“Wine is bottled poetry…, ” I am a lover of all things poetic and this story fed that side of mine to the brim. Like the big, bad wolf in Red Riding Hood, this is a singularly spectacular book, and I recommend it to anyone who loved a bit of magic&shine. 

Reality will be there all the time, sure you can lose yourself in such worlds for a while, can you not?