First, he is a Boy, born to a Mother who cannot abide his existence. Despite her torments, the Boy finds a way to survive and create a small space for himself in the world. In lyrical, songlike language, Tracy Lynne Oliver lures read­ers into an epic tale that will appeal to fans of Our Share of Night and The Changeling.

The Boy endures unspeakable cruelties, saved only by a mysterious magic that intervenes in moments of need: magic he learns is his to command. When he finally escapes the Mother, a beguiling circus troupe welcomes him into their family and the Boy begins to imagine a life beyond survival, one where circus li­ons roar and enchanted forests spiral far into the distance. For the first time, he dis­covers chosen family, community, and love. He eagerly apprentices under the circus’s conjurer—only to realize his gifts far outstrip his mentor’s. Thus the Boy becomes the Magician. But as ambition bends his power, a primal threat stalks, determined to destroy not just the Magi­cian, but all he holds dear.

Echoing the fairytale cadence of Helen Oyeyemi and Gerardo Sámano Córdova’s disquieting excavation of grief and trauma, Tracy Lynne Oliver has created a spell­binding world of twisted patriarchal darkness and a powerful magic that threatens to consume everyone, including its wielder. A debut novel of uncommon accomplishment, Magician establishes its author as a new voice that will hold readers rapt.

Praise for Magician:

“Full of harrowing twists, spellbinding relationships, and captivating prose. In this hauntingly beautiful debut, Oliver crafts an intricate tale of survival, power, and consequence that will leave readers craving more.”—Sydney Gaw, Booklist

“A breathtaking novel that reads like an epic poem of trauma and survival, Magician is a dark modern myth about power, inheritance, and the dangerous line between protection and destruction. The story follows Boy whose only defense against unimaginable cruelty is a dangerous, evolving magic that intervenes when nothing else will. As he grows into the Magician, survival gives way to reckoning. Unflinching in its portrayal of abuse and trauma, yet strikingly beautiful in both its prose and imagery, Tracy Lynne Oliver delivers an unforgettable debut, one that confronts inherited darkness and asks the terrifying question of whether goodness can survive what we do to stay alive.”—Constance Sayers, author of The Ladies of the Secret Circus

“Magician is rapturously beautiful and, I would go so far as to say, a perfect novel. Tracy Lynne Oliver’s sentences are an excitable reader’s dream—as meticulous and decisive as any story could ever want and yet so unforeseeable and inventive they seem to jiggle in place. If you’re interested in American fiction at its utmost, this is an event.”—Dennis Cooper, author of I Wished

“Magician is a beautiful, brutal, and spellbinding feat of a debut novel written by one of our most captivating living writers.”—Amber Tamblyn, author of Any Man and Listening in the Dark: Women Reclaiming the Power of Intuition

“I have been impatiently awaiting a novel by Tracy Lynne Oliver for years. Magician, a dark tale about the Boy, the Mother, and the magic the Boy wields was well worth that wait. With echoes of Mariana Enriquez, Dan Chaon, and Cormac McCarthy, the book hypnotizes, holds you utterly at its mercy. It’s rare for me to sink so wholly into a narrative, but sink I did, and I didn’t want to come back up.”—Lindsay Hunter, author of Hot Springs Drive

Reading Group Guide

Guide by Keturah Jenkins

1. Why do you think the author chose not to name the Magician, his Mother, or his Her? If given proper names, how would that have changed the tone of the book, if at all?

2. The title hints at a focus on magic and those who perform it. In what ways does the title Magician apply to more than just the Man? Specifically, consider how his Mother, his Her, and Sullivan each possess and use forms of magic.

3. The novel opens with the Magician experiencing one of several devastating moments in his life: “It was all his fault” (p. 1). Examine why the author chose to begin the story here. Consider how the rest of the novel builds toward this pivotal scene in the field, with the Magician surrounded by dead bodies.

4. Magician is a dark fantasy coming-of-age centered on identity, trauma, and lost innocence. In the story, the protagonist struggles to separate from his mother, “There could be no Son if there was no Mother” (pg. 130), while surviving his brutal existence. Describe how the author defies traditional conventions of the genre.

5. The Mother, herself a victim of severe abuse by her father and brothers, harbors deep hatred for her son. She resists losing her identity to motherhood, even accusing her child of existing “most likely to spite her” (p. 22). This raises a question: what if she had given birth to a girl, a “little sister” (p. 22-3), instead of a boy? How might the child’s upbringing have been different? Do you think the Mother could have “endured this invasion” (p. 23) for a daughter, as she suggests?