I made it 126 pages into this ponderous, dull, pointless book before giving up. 126 pages is enough of an investment. If the author can't create one interesting character or one exciting event in that amount of pages ... Endless discussion of fictional books on magic that had nothing to do with the plot, written by fictional authors who also had nothing to do with the plot. Even the descriptions of the three acts of magic were boring. This book was supposedly a huge best-seller, but only about 30% of the people who read it gave it top marks. I can only conclude that there was a huge marketing campaign to put it before the public's eye.