A Reader's Ramble- The Night Circus

For this Reader's Ramble, I will be reviewing The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern.

Page count- 387

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. 
Written in rich, seductive prose, this spell-casting novel is a feast for the senses and the heart.

Plot- Wow, this book took me forever to read. From November 16th to December 10th.. that's the longest I've taken to read a book in a long time.
Partly because I started it in the middle of NaNoWriMo, and that didn't leave me much time for reading.
But also, the plot is a reason this is a long read.
I'm going to state the positives first, because there's a good amount of them.

The whole story line and idea of this book was just out of this world. I honestly think Morgenstern is a genius to come up with a book this cool and unique. The whole concept of The Night Circus was very intriguing and magical. I wish something like it really existed.
I loved the fact that when I was reading this book, it was as if I was transported into their world and I'm there with them. Her writing is THAT GOOD. It's beautiful and lyrical, relying on mostly prose rather than dialogue.
I get bored of prose after a while though normally, but this prose was so dang amazing.
Her descriptions... oh my gosh.. incredible... made me feel like I was in the scene, literally. Just wonderful!
The whole concept of this novel was really mystical and I did really like it.

Negatives.. Well, the biggest one for me was that this book was a little confusing. I never truly understood the competition, or why they were even doing it. I really don't even know how or why the two characters fell in love. One day he just kisses her. Like, there's no lead up to it or explanation for why they feel any love for each other.
The time frame changes a lot, which was also a little confusing.
 Though the writing style is beautiful, it's also quite complex. There were some words I didn't understand here and there, and sometimes I'd get really bored and find myself skipping over paragraphs of prose just to find some dialogue.
The beginning and the end of the book are exciting. The middle... not so much. The middle was what took me the longest. Nothing really happens, so I ended up having to force myself through it, which I don't enjoy doing.
The positives and the negatives balance out each other, you could say.

Setting- A bunch of different places. The setting didn't really play that much of a factor. But, I guess the setting could be the circus itself, which was downright cool! A circus made of all black and white with a bunch of different mysterious, magical, enchanting rooms? Take me there!

Characters- There were so many of them.
I'd get confused on which character was which sometimes and forget their roles in the book. I could never truly care about a character because there were so many, and the author doesn't really ever focus on one in particular.
But I mean, for circus people, they're pretty awesome. The Murray Twins and Bailey were my favorites.

The two main characters Celia and Marco were pretty good. They were decently developed. What they both had to go through just tugged at the strings of my heart. They both would be such enchanting people to meet in real life. Their magic was so unique and mind blowing.
So, for characters as a whole, they were good, not great, but certainly not terrible.

Cover- I love it! It's so cool and different! I wish that circus existed. That cover definitely catches my eye on a shelf.

Overall- I feel like if this book was more YA, I would have enjoyed it more. I'm not saying I don't enjoy adult books, I just think I could relate and sympathize to the characters more if they were my age, and if I knew them better. I'm glad to be done with it, to be honest. Overall, it was a great read, but not one of my favorites.
It had its strong and weak points. I would recommend it. Maybe you'll like it way more than I did, because it is a good read, I'm just picky.
With that being said, The Night Circus gets 4/5 stars!