Welcome to The Night Circus

“The Circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it, no paper notices on downtown posts and billboards, no mentions or advertisements in local newspapers. It is simply there when yesterday it was not. The towering tents are striped in white and black no golds and crimsons to be seen. No color at all, save for the neighboring trees and the grass of the surrounding fields. Black-and-white stripes on grey sky; countless tents of varying shapes and sizes, with an elaborate wrought-iron fence encasing them in a colorless world. Even what little ground is visible from outside is black or white, painted or powdered, or treated with some other circus trick. But it is not open for business. Not just yet. Within hours everyone in town has heard about it. By afternoon the news has spread several towns over. Word of mouth is a more effective method of advertisement than typeset words and exclamation points on paper pamphlets or posters. It is impressive and unusual news, the sudden appearance of a mysterious circus. People marvel at the staggering height of the tallest tents. They stare at the clock that sits just inside the gates that no one can properly describe. And the black sign painted in white letters that hands open the gates, the one that reads: Opens at Nightfall Closes at Dawn” (page 1)

                Once the sun begins to set even more people begin to crowd at the gates. Awaiting entrance to the mysterious circus that only appeared earlier that day, you can hardly believe your excitement, the slight curiosity pounding through your veins as your heart starts to beat faster as you approach the ticket booth.

“The woman stationed inside is watching and smiling at you. You are not entirely sure what to do. She waves at you, a small but friendly gesture to assure you that everything is fine.” (page 386)

                You struggle to find the right words to say, she smiles again and hands you a ticket with her black gloved hand, you give her the payment required and she beckons you to take your first step into the circus, as you are just about to pass her she speaks,

                “Welcome to the Night Circus.” You nod and walk past her still mystified by the entire place. Once inside you see even more tents that were there to begin with, you wonder what tent to visit first.

“You step into the bright, open courtyard surrounded by striped tents. Curving pathways along the perimeter lead away from the courtyard, turning into unseen mysteries dotted with twinkling lights. There are vendors traversing the crowd around you, selling refreshments and oddities creations flavored with vanilla and honey, chocolate and cinnamon. A contortionist in a sparkling black costume twists on a platform nearby, bending her body into impossible shapes. A juggler tosses globes of black and white and silver high into the air, where they seem to hover before falling again into his hands, his attentive spectators applauding. All bathed in glowing light.” (Page 84)

               

The two things that catch your eyes are the carousel and the massive clock. You look over to your left and you see the first tent that seems to interest you, it is one of the tallest tents.

                “In this tent, suspended high above you, there are people. Acrobats, trapeze artists, aerialists. Illuminated by dozens of round glowing lamps hanging from the top of the tent like planets or stars. There are no nets. You watch the performance from this precarious vantage point, directly below the performers with nothing in between. There are girls in feathered costumes who spin at various heights, suspended by ribbons that they can manipulate. Marionettes that control their own strings. Normal chairs with legs and backs act as trapezes. Round spheres that resemble birdcages rise and descend while one or more aerialists move from within the sphere to without, standing on top or the hanging bars on the bottom. In the center of the tent there is a man in a tuxedo, suspended by one leg that is tied with a silver cord, hands clasped behind his back. He begins to move, extremely slowly. His arms reach out from his sides, first one and then the other, until they hang below his head. He starts to spin. Faster and faster, until he is only a blur at the end of a rope. He stops, suddenly, and falls. The audience dives out of the way below him, clearing a space of bare, hard ground. You cannot bear to watch. You cannot look away. Then he stops at eye level with the crowd. Suspended by the silver rope that now seems endlessly long. Top had undisturbed on his head, arms calmly by his sides. As the crowd regains composure, he lifts a gloved hand and removes his hat. Bending at the waist, he takes a dramatic, inverted bow.” (Page 105)

You clap your hands as hard as you can at the wonderful feat that bestowed in front of your eyes. You begin to wonder how the man accomplished such a task and remaining calm for that matter. The crowd began to depart form the tent, as you wondered which you should choose next.  You wonder across the field again and decide to get a cup of hot chocolate and some chocolate mice from the vendor. He smiles as he hands you your treats and you continue on. You notice an interesting statue in the clearing. The statues look so real, and you swear that you slightly see them move.

“Standing on the platform in the midst of the crowd, high enough that they can be viewed clearly from all angles, are two figures, still as statues.  The woman wears a dress something akin to a bridal gown constructed for a ballerina, white and frothy and laced with black ribbons that flutter in the night air. Her legs are encased in striped stockings, her feel in tall black button-up boots. Her dark hair is piled in waves upon her head, adorned with sprays of white feathers. Her companion is a handsome man, somewhat taller than she, in an impeccably tailored pinstriped suit. His shirt is a crisp white, his tie black and pristinely knotted. A black bowler hat sits upon his head. They stand entwined but not touching, their heads tilted toward each other lips frozen in the moment before (or after) the kiss.” (Page 225)

You begin to walk along a path that not many are on. For a moment all goes quiet and you wonder if you have entered a tent. You look at your surroundings all you see is black and white stripes and the white powdered ground at your feet. You start to turn back however the path you were taking no longer exists where you were. You then continue forward until you see an opening to a tent. You look in confusion around you as you look for some sign of a person around you. You decide to enter the tent. Inside sits a tree that holds the only lights illuminating the tent.  

“A bare black tree. It is not like other trees… This one is covered in dripping white candles… “That’s the wishing tree,”… “It’s lovely the way wishes are added to it, by lighting candles with ones that are already lit and adding them to the branches. New wishes ignited by old wishes” (Page 128)

You make your wish, felling oddly calm that the wish you have just made will come true on its own time. You depart the tent to an open crowd however none glance in your direction. You make your way further into the circus wondering what you’ll discover next.

“But the one that catches your eye is smaller, as is the tent on which it hangs. Looping white letters on a black background. Feats of Illustrious Illusion. The entrance is open, and a line if patrons files into the tent… Inside it is lit by a line of black iron sconces along the rounded wall contains noting but a ring of plain wooden chairs. There are only about twenty of them, into staggered rows so that the view from each seat is comparable… The rest of the seats fill quickly, save for two: the one to his immediate left and another across the circle… The space where the audience had entered now appears to be solid wall, seamlessly bending with the rest of the tent… There is now a dark-haired woman in a black coat sitting to his left… She was not there before the door disappeared… The empty chair across the circles bursts into flame. The panic is instant. Those occupying the chairs closest to the flaming chair abandon their seats and rush for the door, only to find that there is no longer a door to be found, only a solid wall. The flames grow steadily higher, staying close to the chair, licking around the wood, though it does not appear to be burning… The woman… winks… before standing and walking to the center of the circle. Amidst the panic, she calmly unbuttons her coat and removes it, tossing it with a delicate gesture toward the burning chair. What had been heavy wool becomes a long piece of black silk that ripples like water over the chair. The flames vanish. Only a few lingering wisps of smoke remain, along with the sharp smell of charred wood that is slowly changing to the comforting scent of a fireplace, tinged with something like cinnamon or clove. The woman, standing in the center of the circle of chairs, pulls back the black silk with a flourish, revealing a still-intact chair on which is now a perch of several white doves. Another flourish, and the black silk folds and curves in on itself, becoming a black top hat. The woman places it on her head, topping off an ensemble that looks like a ball gown fashioned out of the night sky: black silk dotted with sparkling white crystals. She acknowledges her audience with a subtle bow. The illusionist has made her entrance.” (Page 111-112)

You gasp as every trick she does seems more impossible than the next, she turns her top hat into a large black raven, manipulates the space around her, every trick looks so simple yet intricate. You cannot fathom that she is just an illusionist. You don’t feel like these are just illusions they feel so real. The act is over and she disappears from the center of the ring. The audience claps anyhow and depart form the tent. You walk into other tents as the night goes on. A tent that allows you to walk among the clouds. The next you choose is the hall of mirrors however you leave quickly from it. You then stumble through the ice garden and then into a labyrinth that you find yourself stuck in until you want to actually exit then the next door you chose so happens to be the exit. As you embark further into the circus you look up at the marvelous clock and see that it is almost midnight and that you should be getting back soon. You decide on a few more tents before you leave.

The clouds. 

The Labyrinth

 Hall Of Mirrors. 

“It is late, so there is no line for the fortune-teller. While outside the cool night air is scented with caramel and smoke, this tent is warm and smells of incense and roses and beeswax. You do not wait long in the antechamber before passing through the beaded curtain. It makes a sound like rain as the beads collide. The room beyond is lined with candles. You sit down at the table in the center of the room. Your chair is surprisingly comfortable.
The fortune-teller’s face is hidden begin a fine black veil, but the light catches her eyes as she smiles. She has no crystal ball. No deck of cards. Only a handful of sparkling silver stars that she scatters across the velvet-covered table, reading them like runes. She refers to things that she could not know with uncanny specificity. She tells you facts that you already knew. Information you might have guessed. Possibilities you cannot fathom. The stars on the table almost seem to move in the undulating candlelight. Shifting and changing before your eyes. Before you leave, the fortune-teller reminds you that the future is never set in stone.” (Page 371)

You feel oddly comfortable with the outcome she has fashioned to predict for you. You take a deep breath letting out the lose excitement you feel as you realize your back in the courtyard where the juggler had been. You watch as the contortionist moves.

“A woman stands on the platform in a very fitted costume covered in black-and-silver swirls. She is twisting and bending in such a way that it seems both horrible and elegant… The contortionist lifts a small silver metal hoop from the ground, garnishing it with a few simple but impressive movements. She passes it to a man in the front of the crowd, in order to establish that it is solid. When he hands it back to her, she passers her entire body through it extending her limbs in fluid, dance- like motions…  After discarding the hoop, she places a small box in the center of the platform. The box looks no more than a foot high, through in reality it is slightly larger than that. While the act of a fully grown (if below average-sized) woman condensing herself into such a confined space would be impressive regardless of the details of the box, it is made even more impressive in this case by the fact that the box is made of glass, completely transparent. The edges are metal, oxidized to a blackish tinge, but the side panels and the lid are clear glass, so she is visible the entire time as she bends and twists and folds herself into the tiny space. She does it slowly, making each minute movement part of the show, until her body and head are completely within the box and only her hand remains without, sticking out the top. The… perspective looks impossible, a bit of leg here, the curve of a shoulder there, a part of her other arm underneath a foot. Only one hand remains, it waves cheerfully before pulling the lid closed. It latches automatically, and the box is undeniably closed, with the contortionist clearly visible form inside. And then the glass box with the woman trapped inside slowly fills with white smoke it curls thought the tiny cracks and spaces not occupied by limbs or torso, and seeps between her fingers as they press against the glass… suddenly with a popping noise, the box breaks. The glass panels fall to the sides and the lid collapses downward. Curls of smoke rise into the night air. The box, or, rather the small pile of glass upon the platform that had once been a box, is empty. The contortionist is gone.” (Page 110-111)

You stare in wonder at the broken box until the clock chimes and it’s now one in the morning. One last tent before you depart.

“The sign outside this tent is accompanied by a small box full of smooth black stones. The text instructs you to take one with you as you enter. Inside, the tent is dark, the ceiling covered with open black umbrellas, the curbing handles hanging down like icicles. The air carries the salty tinge of the ocean. You walk over to the edge and look inside. The gravel crunches beneath your feet. It is shallow, but it is glowing. A shimmering shifting light cascades up through the surface of the water. A soft radiance, enough to illuminate the pool and the stones that sit at the bottom. Hundreds of stones, each identical to the one you hold in your hand. The light beneath filters through the spaces between the stones. Reflections ripple around the room making it appear as the entire tent was underwater. You sit on the wall, turning your black stone over and over in your fingers. The stillness of the tent becomes a quiet melancholy. Memories begin creep forward from hidden corners of your mind. Passing disappointments. Lost chances and lost causes. Heartbreaks and pain and desolate, horrible loneliness. Sorrows you through long forgotten mingle with still-fresh wounds. The stone feels heavier in your hand. When you drop it in the pool to join the rest of the stones you feel lighter. As though you have released something more than a smooth polished piece of rock.” (Page 282-283)

You leave the tent feeling refreshed and every burden has fallen off your shoulders. It’s now 2 in the morning and you feel the exhaustion creep onto your body and over your mind. You make your way for the exit. Again staring at the clock. You observe the people around you for what felt like the first time, you notice most of the people that are left are wearing all black and grey with a sparking splash of red.

My idea to promote my book is exactly what my book is about The Night Circus. I hope you enjoyed your time and I really hope that this will inspire you to pick up the book and read the beautiful love story of enchantment and mystery, illusions and conflicts. Please come again.