The first two book notes are below. However, now that I have a blog, I will not be adding new books to this page. To see the latest book notes, visit http://scottstein.powerblogs.com.

I don’t know that I’ve read anything quite like Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell. It’s been called a novel of the fantastic, which it clearly is, since the story revolves around two magicians. It’s been called a novel of manners in the tradition of Jane Austen, for its portrayal of English life and its close attention to character and relationships. But this is unlike any fantasy novel I can recall. And while Clarke skillfully employs literary devices to give the reader the sensation of reading a novel from early 19th Century Britain, once I was immersed in the story, it made me think of nothing but itself. Maybe we sometimes forget why we first fell in love with reading novels. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell is a welcome reminder. I got lost in another world, enjoyed all of the nearly 800 pages, and didn't worry when the plot seemed to be advancing slowly. The novel is so rich with joyful invention (including footnotes that sometimes are stories unto themselves), it didn’t matter, when the end approached, that I knew it could not pay off with the sort of meaning and impact we sometimes demand from our fiction. I was happy to just bask in the pleasure of the journey.