Elegant, witty and utterly compelling, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell creates a past world of great mystery and beauty that will hold the reader in thrall until the last page. He becomes fascinated by the shadowy figure of the Raven King, and his heedless pursuit of long-forgotten magic threatens, not only his partnership with Norrell, but everything that he holds dear. Summary: Part of The Bloomsbury Phantastic series three books tracing the tradition of fantasy from Edgar Allan Poe to Neil Gaiman and Susanna Clarke. Neil Gaiman Clarke's imagination is prodigious, her pacing is masterly and she knows how to employ dry humor in the service of majesty. Mr Norrell has never conquered his lifelong habits of secrecy, while Strange will always be attracted to the wildest, most perilous magic. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell is unquestionably the finest English novel of the fantastic written in the last 70 years. But the partnership soon turns to rivairy. Together, they dazzle the country with their feats. At the dawn of the nineteenth century, two very different magicians emerge to change.

Jonathan Strange is charming, rich and arrogant. There he meets a brilliant young magician and takes him as a pupil. News spreads of the return of magic to England and, persuaded that he must help the government in the war against Napoleon, Mr Norrell goes to London.

Then the reclusive Mr Norrell of Hurtfew Abbey appears and causes the statues of York Cathedral to speak and move. Now at the beginning of the nineteenth century, he is barely more than a legend, and England, with its mad King and its dashing poets, no longer believes in practical magic. A human child brought up by fairles, the Raven King blended fairy wisdom and human reason to create English magic. Centuries ago when magic still existed in England, the greatest magician of them all was the Raven King.

Mr strange and mr norrell book