There is nothing small-minded about Susanna Clarke's debut novel, nearly 800 pages about the return of magic to 19th-century England. Every kind of spell seems to haunt its pages, every objection to magic is made, every sticky end catalogued. Clarke employs diverse writerly strategies (footnotes, Tolkienesque poetry, lists, dramatic irony, pathetic fallacy...). It is like Noah's ark: large, yes, and strangely capacious.

Given the ambition of its subject matter, then, and the punishing width of its spine, it's odd how little actually happens. There are magical duels, a curse of perpetual darkness, spells of containment, of invisibility, of protection. Wars are aided by occult practices while human hostages are forced to dance night after night in Faerie. Mirrors are breached. Bones ground and drunk. Yet the caulk that surrounds these glittering moments is regular old reading. England's last two magicians--the proud and secretive Mr. Norrell and his affable, ambitious protégé, Jonathan Strange--are mad for literature, and the getting and perusing of books play a pivotal role throughout. In presenting the bloodless study of magic, Clarke has been perhaps too successful.

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