BOOK: The Prestige by Christopher Priest

Title: The Prestige
Author: Christopher Priest
Publisher: Tor Books
ISBN: 0312858868
List Price: $14.95

Review: In most magic, misdirection plays a major role in getting an audience to believe that what has just transpired is a result of supernatural forces. In Christopher Priest's The Prestige, misdirection is not used to fool the reader into thinking something supernatural has taken place, but rather to keep the mystery and intrigue of a multi-generational feud at the forefront of the reader's mind.

The Prestige is a novel about two turn of the century stage magicians whose feud, in perfect Houdini homage, begins when one Alfred Borden publically uncovers the secrets of Rupert Angier during a house call seance. From this moment forward, the two competing stage magicians stop at nothing to sabotage each other's headlining magic career in order to further their own. It is with one seemingly impossible stage trick called The Transported Man, where Alfred Bordon steps into one wooden cabinet and instantaneously emerges from another cabinet located across the theatre stage, that the two magician's feud escalates into a deadly game. The Transported Man is the one trick that Rupert Angier cannot dissect or recreate. Determined to know Bordon's secrets, Angier stops at nothing to either discover how the trick is performed or create his own superior version of the trick.

When Angier meets a reclusive and hardworking physicist by the name of Nikola Tesla, whose work in electrical conductivity through the atmosphere is both mysterious and controversial, he gains the upper hand. Enlisting Tesla to build him a powerful and dangerous machine to aide in his stage routine, Angier gains the upper hand he needs to outshow Borden in the arena of Victorian era stage magic. It is with this new trick that the tables are turned on the magicians' feud. Borden becomes the victim of both professional and personal curiosity that will lead to surprising and devastating consequences.

Told through the magicians' personal journals and their descendants' first person narrative, The Prestige is a novel filled with magical, scientific and paranormal history masterfully blended into a fantasy that earns your suspension of disbelief rather than demanding it. It is a story of two men and their professional obsessions. Like a magical Kavalier & Clay, The Prestige examines the darker side of human curiosity and what it means to mislead others for profit in the entertainment world. At its most subtle, this book could be viewed as a commentary on the cut-throat and mimic filled entertainment industry of today. On the surface, it is a robust, well written novel that ties quirky history and age-old human nature into a compelling period piece. Whether you are a fan of mystery novels, the history of magic, contemporary fantasy or just well written literature that blurs the boundaries between genres, The Prestige is well worth your time and money.

The Prestige is currently being adapted into a film by Christopher Nolan. It stars Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman as the two feuding magicians and David Bowie as Nikola Tesla. Because of the setup and framework of the novel, I am leery of a film adaptation, but eager to see what the able director of Memento and Insomnia (and obviously drunken director of Batman Begins) is able to do with this great novel.

Rating: 4.25 / 5

Buy a copy of The Prestige from Amazon.com: Consume.