The Prestige by Christopher Priest and Simon Vance

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The Prestige
Available from Amazon
Price: $20.24
Updated on 12-28-2008.

Features

Audio CD

Publisher: Blackstone Audiobooks; Unabridged edition (October 2006)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0786168412

ISBN-13: 978-0786168415

Product Dimensions: 5.6 x 5.3 x 1.5 inches

Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces ()

Amazon.com Review
The Washington Post called this "a dizzying magic show of a novel, chock-a-block with all the props of Victorian sensation fiction: seances, multiple narrators, a family curse, doubles, a lost notebook, wraiths, and disembodied spirits; a haunted house, awesome mad-doctor machinery, a mausoleum, and ghoulish horrors; a misunderstood scientist, impossible disappearances; the sins of the fathers visited upon their descendants." Winner of the 1996 World Fantasy Award, The Prestige is even better than that, because unlike many Victorians, Priest writes crisp, unencumbered prose. And anyone who's ever thrilled to the arcing electricity in the "It's alive!" scene in Frankenstein will relish the "special effects" by none other than Nikola Tesla. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly
Priest, one of Granta's Best Young British Novelists (1983 list), has not been overproductive since he made a small reputation with The Affirmation and The Glamour, published here more than a dozen years ago. His new novel (the title of which refers to the residue left after a magician's successful trick) is enthrallingly odd. In a carefully calculated period style that is remarkably akin to that of the late Robertson Davies, Priest writes of a pair of rival magicians in turn-of-the-century London. Each has a winning trick the other craves, but so arcane is the nature of these tricks, so incredibly difficult are they to perform, that they take on a peculiar life of their own?in one case involving a mysterious apparent double identity, in the other a reliance on the ferocious powers unleashed in the early experimental years of electricity. The rivalry of the two men is such that in the end, though both are ashamed of the strength of their feelings of spite and envy, it consumes them both, and affects their respective families for generations. This is a complex tale that must have been extremely difficult to tell in exactly the right sequence, while still maintaining a series of shocks to the very end. Priest has brought it off with great imagination and skill. It's only fair to say, though, that the book's very considerable narrative grip is its principal virtue. The characters and incidents have a decidedly Gothic cast, and only the restraint that marks the story's telling keeps it on the rails.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Reader Reviews
This review is from: The Prestige (Paperback) Written on the cover of this book is the phrase "Winner of a World Fantasy Award" -- those are the words that first caught my attention. And in retrospect, I find The Prestige entirely deserving of that honor. Few and far between are the books that I pick up and can still remember several years later, but it's been three or more years since I read this one, and certain vibes and moments that I took from it are still with me. This is due, in part, to an average-to-good plotline, but in the end, to Priest's own sleight-of-hand as an author -- he shows an impressive range, a nice attention to detail, and a subdued sense of style which sets the perfect tone for this tale of rival vaudeville magicians in the late 19th century... Set in 1878, and focused on two magicians who are rivals in both business and love, this story is delivered in a style that made it literally impossible to put down (I think I surreptitiously read it during school classes for about two days, non-stop, and might as well have been absent. I don't even know what I missed). Moving from one character's perspective to another, the story unfolds almost entirely through journal entries written by the two protagonists. The intriguing conceit of the novel is that these journals are not discovered until almost a hundred years later, when the descendants of the two rivals meet and feel a mysterious connection to each other. As they slowly uncover the series of mysterious and unnatural events which befell their warring ancestors, the action moves fluidly from past to present to future and back, almost without warning. The drastically different narrative styles used in the two journals reveal that Mr. Priest must have an incredible amount of talent -- they might as well have been written by two different people, so unalike are their tone and perspective. The details of the plot are far too complicated to summarize, but I would go out of my way to recommend this book to fiction lovers. While the story does not leave you with any significant knowledge or insight into the meaning of life, it is pleasure reading at its best, and there is a lot to be said for that.

The Prestige
List Price: $25.95
Available from Amazon
Price: $20.24
Updated on 12-28-2008.