There are so many different plots throughout the book. This idea of a ‘game’ is referenced throughout the book and I really enjoyed all the metaphors and this different fantasy angle. But the circus is also the site of a game of manipulation and magic between Marco and Celia who (inevitably 🙄) fall in love. It also shows the perspective of the people who visit the circus, which I really enjoyed.

The Night Circus follows, well, a circus throughout its development, running, and the lives of its perfomers. So The Starless Sea was my first real exposure to quality fantasy writing – and believe me when I say that these books are quality fantasy writing. I guess I can thank COVID for giving me so much time to fill that I really broadened the genres of books I read, and I haven’t looked back (goodbye John Green!). Before that, I’d been an ardent reader of young adult romance… and that was about it. Last year, I read Morgenstern’s second novel, The Starless Sea, and just fell in love with her writing style. I had HIGH expectations of The Night Circus. 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.

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. 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. 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.

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