Carry On by Rainbow Rowell

As the midway point of July approaches, I am finding myself a little bit behind in my blogging. Thankfully, my reading is more or less on track. I just have been lazy about writing lately. I'll chalk that up to the general malaise of living through a pandemic and try to whip myself back into shape here. 

I chose Carry On as part of my Then Versus Now Challenge, so I picked it up right after I finished reading Eleanor and Park at the start of this month. This book has a strange origin. It was first mentioned by Rowell in another one of her young adult novels, Fangirl. In Fangirl, the main character writes fanfiction about this series, which is meant to be a Harry Potter-like set of fantasy novels that exist in that universe. Eventually, Rowell decided to take that fictional series and make it real. Hopefully that makes sense - I'm finding that it's difficult to explain this situation clearly and succinctly. Basically, this book started off as part of the background of another novel, and Rowell decided to take that background element and turn it into an actual book series.

The plot concerns a group of teenage mages attending Watford, a magical boarding school in England. The narration alternates between a handful of characters, but it mainly centers around Simon Snow and his roommate/rival Baz Grimm-Pitch. Simon is the all-important "chosen one," the powerful mage that is destined to take down the Insidious Humdrum, a mysterious villain whose ability to suck magic out of the atmosphere threatens the very existence of the world of mages. Simon is an orphan that was introduced into the world of magic late, and as a result, he struggles to control his power. He is able to make it through school with the help of his highly intelligent friend Penelope and his beautiful girlfriend Agatha. Together, the trio have had several clashes with the Humdrum over the years and are gearing up for their inevitable final confrontation with him.

One continual thorn in Simon's side, however, is his roommate Baz. The pair have been locked into a fierce rivalry since they met and often get into fights or try to sabotage each other. Baz comes from an old, wealthy family of mages and is less-than impressed with Simon's uncontrolled magic. He is also wrapped up in the ongoing political unrest in his community, which is currently dividing the traditional mages like him from the more liberal ones, like Simon. The two groups disagree over the best way to defeat the Humdrum and are very suspicious of each other.

As the novel begins, Simon and Baz are entering their eighth and final year at Watford. Towards the beginning of their first term, the ghost of Baz's mother appears and gives Simon a message about finding her killer. Simon, when he delivers the message to Baz, promises to help him unravel the mystery. From that moment on, the pair call a truce and work together to try and figure out what happened. Their journey leads them to make several startling discoveries about both the Humdrum that threatens their world, and, of course, themselves.

This was a really fun read. Rowell's writing was both emotional and funny, and I really enjoyed both Simon and Baz as characters. I was invested in the story and liked exploring how Rowell played off the tropes common in fantasy novels. She put a lot of clever twists on things and created a cute universe. The magic system was especially unique, as it worked through using idioms and common phrases rather than an established set of permanent spells. As language changes over time, their spells do too. Another aspect I enjoyed was all the diversity and representation in the book. There are a wide array of different cultures and sexualities present, and I didn't catch any glaring stereotypes or problems, like in Eleanor and Park. It felt like a cool, modern fantasy and I had a good time reading it. I even liked the ending, and I don't always feel that way when it comes to young adult fantasy novels. 

My main criticism of the story was in its complicated relationship with Harry Potter. In Fangirl, the Simon Snow books were created to be a stand in for that series so that readers could understand the fanfiction that her protagonist was writing. By making that series real, Rowell was stuck with a lot of  elements that borrow heavily from the Potter books. While she does create an entirely separate universe with its own details, the story definitely shares a lot of similarities with J.K. Rowling's universe. It was very clear that Simon was the Harry of the story, Baz was the Draco, Penelope was the Hermione, the Humdrum was the Voldemort, etc. Again, this story is clearly different in its specifics, but I don't think it completely escapes its origins of being an alternate version of Potter. I'm not sure if this novel would have felt complete if I didn't have the framework of Rowling's books in my mind before reading this one. That being said though, I did still enjoy it a great deal.

After being disappointed in my reread of Eleanor and Park earlier this month, I am glad that I followed it up with Carry On. I really do like the way Rowell writes and builds relationships between her characters, and I was relieved to see that in her later works, her representation of non-white characters has improved.  I was happy to pick up the sequel to this novel next, Wayward Son, and see how Simon and Baz's story continued.

Challenge Tally

Then vs. Now: 14/27

Total Books Read in 2020: 51