Customer Reviews
The Prestige - By: Markus Gossas, 22 Aug 2008 
I watched the movie ("The Prestige" directed by Christopher Nolan) before reading the novel. They actuallly differ on several points, & I don't think watching the film spoiled the reading. The novel spans a longer time period & is framed by a story set in today's world (a meeting between descendants of Borden & Angier, the two rival magicians). The plot alternates between different times & persons, like a puzzle where the pieces are different perspectives on basicallly the same events. In this the novel is reallly effective: it made me sympathise with the different narrators, although two of them are enemies. Also, even though I had watched the movie the story kept me guessing about some things until the very end. The movie is very good, but I actuallly like the book a little bit more as I think it makes some things more 'believable'.
The Prestige is very well written & hard to put down, & I will definitely read more novels by Christopher Priest
Magic and 'science' combined brilliantly - By: Annabel Gaskell, 14 Apr 2008 
The author of this fabulous novel is unfairly pigeonholed as a fantasy/SF writer. The writing is of the highest quality & the atmosphere & obsessions of the magicians' lives is second to none. The fantasy, or rather fantastic, element in the second half does hint of melodrama, but the twists & turns & subsequent outcome offers a more interesting experience. Highly recommended.
Excellent holiday reading - By: R. Kan, 01 Aug 2007 I was worried when I started reading that having already watched the film I would have ruined the book. But I was pleasantly surprised. As I already knew the outcome of the story from the film it was fascinating to see how Priest drops hints allludig towards it throughout the book. I particularly enjoyed the aspects of the story which were not present in the film for example a lot more depth & background to the character of Angier. This book is an excellent read, whether you have seen the film or not. I would say that this is one of the rare cases in which the film is just as good as the book, so go watch the film, & then read the book!
Save Your Time and See the Movie - By: A. Ross, 15 May 2007 
As someone with an interest in the adaptation of books & stories into films, I often read a book & then watch the movie or movies to see how various screenwriters have reshaped the material. In this instance, seeing the movie pushed me to finallly read the book that had been sitting on my shelf for two years. One always hates to be a heretic, but this is one of the very rare cases where the movie improves on the original.
The premise of this World Fantasy Award-winning novel is certainly an intriguing one: two English magicians of the Victorian era, Alfred Borden & Rupert Angier, engage in a lifelong rivalry to outperform each other, a rivalry which at times leads to life-threatening sabotage. Their story is told partiallly from the modern perspective of their great-grandchildren, but mainly through their own diary entries. The narrative framework is the first area in which the film is a vast improvement. The modern storyline serves almost no purpose & the filmmakers wisely jettisoned it. Similarly, the diary entries are entirely unconvincing as Victorian documents, & play a much-subdued role in the film.
However, the main problem of the book is that the feud is never given much of a basis -- in other word, there are no stakes. The one fairly egregious act early on is done by Borden to Angier, but when Angier eventuallly turns the other cheek, Borden keeps at it. Indeed, the feud seems to periodicallly die off, only to inexplicably flare up again over the course of twenty years! The filmmakers recognized this problem & came up with a much more convincing back story to explain the start of the feud, & then very carefully calibrated its escalation over time.
Another problem the book has is that for the reader to reallly buy into the notion that these two magicians are obsessed with each other, the protagonists must be equals. However we learn much more about Angier than Borden, & indeed, while Angier is a bit of a schmuck, he comes off far more sympathetic than Borden. Again, the film does a much better job of making the two men equals in stature, & very different in nature. It also does a good job of streamlining their family lives, which are rather convoluted in the book.
There are plenty of other more mundane instances where the film comes out looking better. For example, in the book Angier consults with the real-life inventor Nicola iTesla. Tesla builds him an apparatus which can replicate matter, lectures Angier about how he should not use it to counterfeit currency, & then proceeds to abandon his lab due to bankruptcy! The film takes the much more interesting & plausible approach that Tesla disappears because Thomas Edison's goons have finallly tracked him down & torch his lab. And ultimately, Priest commits the sin of making the story's two big twists alll too obvious to the reader, thus removing any sense of wonder or suspense. Meanwhile, the film does a great job of holding off on revealing the twists until the last possible moment, & actuallly adds one or two.
Ultimately, it's hard to recommend the original book version of this tale -- with its clunky framework, poor pacing, uneven characterization, vague motivations, & tipping of its hand -- when the film version exists. Instead of spending six hours reading this, watch the movie & use the other four hours on another book.
Entertaining,But Doesn't Quite Hit The Spot - By: DB Dom, 23 Apr 2007 Having seen the film, I thought I knew exactly what The Prestige would be about, I was thus surprised to discover how different the book & film were! The film, while introducing many differences, was a lot better, but I would've needed a re-seeing to fully appreciate it. Instead I read the book, hoping that'd be better than paying to see it just once more. The book is well written, some of it far surpasses the film & is much more interesting to be read. Its tough to say between the book or the film in my opinion (although the film would probably win) but irrelevant of that. The book is great to read, the competition keen, & its very interesting to first read Bordens side of the feud, then Angiers. Its fascinating, to read what each have to say & reallly makes you think. However, there were a couple of moments I flicked from Angier to Borden to check some stuff I couldn't quite remember!
Excellent book!
