By Lev Grossman

Thanks to its success on the small screen, The Magicians is a popular choice on lists of books like Harry Potter. Lev Grossman’s take on magic is about an ordinary guy doing extraordinary things. Allow us to introduce you to Quentin Coldwater, a brilliant young man whose boredom with the everyday sends him reeling through a hedonistic alternate reality creepier than Narnia and more wicked than Hogwarts.

George R. R. Martin puts it best: “The Magicians is to Harry Potter as a shot of Irish whiskey is to a glass of weak tea.” We’ll take the hard stuff.