Isaac Fellman delivers a beautifully written mind-bending novella that explores academic abuse, mental illness and magic. This blend of contemporary and sci-fi is chock-full of morally grey characters making terrible decisions and I loved every second of it.

4.5 stars

This novella was fantastically and beautifully written, though it tangles with some pretty dark subjects. Fellman approaches the topics of academic abuse, academic trauma, and navigating academia as a woman &/or neurodivergant person with a rich sensitivity and understanding, which I deeply empathized with and related to. This is a book as deeply about performance as it is about magic, and it's one that I very much intend to return to at a later date -- while the story is well-crafted and complete, I still have questions that I want to think about and return to at a later time. Highly recommend, and I intend to buy my own copy in the future.

Academic abuse, magic, and science come together in this story about a graduate student in psychiatric magic who can’t stop reading minds and the consequences of her actions as she enters into a new program. Annae is a brilliant graduate student... except her academic career tanked and the only chance to complete her degree and work is to work under the one person known for being brutal. Annae has moved to Engladn to rebuild her life and finish her studies under the seminal magician Marec Górski who is known for bringing to life a homunculus made from his unwanted better self. The Marec that is left is harsh, cold, and difficult to work with yet he is her only chance to finish her work and she can’t stop reading his mind. In fact Annae can’t stop reading people’s minds and soon discovers she has other abilities as well... abilities that will have irrevocable consequences. The more Annae spends times in other people’s minds without their consent the more she becomes obsessed. While she is struggling with the abuse from Marec, Annae decides to turn to the other Dr. Górski, Marec’s homunculus Ariel for help on how to deal with Marec. The more she becomes intwined in their lives the more things become difficult. This story, I’m not gonna lie, felt completely anti-climatic and just kinda left me with questions about what the message of the entire story was?? Annae suffers from academic abuse but she violates people’s minds, and even does something worse, and proceeds to continue doing it??? Like?? Are we suppose to empathize with her? What exactly was the point of this story? I was left wanting more from this world because it was interesting, in a world where science and magic exist and set in an academia setting, this had all the makings to be a really interesting story but I did not find myself connecting with the story or the characters. Unfortunately it just did not work for me.

*Thanks Netgalley and Macmillan-Tor/Forge, Tordotcom for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

I requested this one because it might be an upcoming title I would like to review on my Youtube Channel. However, after reading the first several chapters I have determined that this book does not suit my tastes. So I decided to DNF this one.

A haunting, smart, and very nuanced story about academia, and academic abuse, and what would happen if we could take out the parts of ourselves that cause us pain. Highly recommended, especially for anyone who likes Jekyll and Hyde, anyone who has a complicated relationship with academia (and especially anyone who either loves or hates it), dark academia fans, and anyone who likes books that deal with the intersections of science and magic.

This was, all in all, just excellent. The characters were very real, very flawed, and deeply compelling, universally. The world was intriguing, and the world building walked the line of “not too much” and “not too little” information perfectly, which is a really hard thing to do in a novella. The plot was engaging and really thoughtful.

My single qualm: I found the pacing a little uneven and the story felt like it fizzled a little bit at the end - there were plot aspects that I didn’t feel were satisfyingly resolved, though I actually suspect that may have been a purposeful move on the author’s part. It certainly wasn’t enough to make me knock the book down a star, though I wish it had kept up the momentum it had at the beginning a little more consistently.

All in all, a really excellent read, and highly recommended. thank you so much to Tor and Netgalley for the e-ARC!

** A copy of The Two Brothers Gorski was provided by the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review **

What an unsettling story of academia, toxic competitiveness, magic, science and art.

I didn't DISLIKE anything about this book but I never felt connected to anyone or anything in the story. It just seemed to lack something and I'm not sure what.

3.5. The Two Doctors Górski is an interesting blend of science and magic that I can also appreciate as a critical exploration of some of the most challenging aspects of graduate school culture (the competitiveness, the extraordinarily asymmetric power relations between supervisors and students, and the severe pressure to create particular kinds of research output). Fellman's writing is beautiful, and immediately drew me into the world of the novel. Something about the pacing didn't quite work for me -- I found the build-up and world-building of the first half more interesting than the "climax" and conclusion of the second. It's a very insular story, following only a few characters; I found myself wanting to get to know more of this world outside the narrow frame of the main character's life. I'd happily read another book in this universe, and I'll absolutely seek out more from Fellman.

A short novel about a scientific approach to the study of magic. Has a hint of Vita Nostra, but just a hint. In this story, a student of magic, Annae, is upset at Dr Gorski's treatment of her, and so she reaches out to his humunculous- the other Dr Gorski. At the end of it, I didn't really know what to think.

I went into this book completely blind, intrigued by the premise of trauma and how this affects people. I did not read the synopsis, so I had no idea magic was involved, but it all clicked and made sense instantaneously. I loved the idea of Annae being unable to stop reading minds as a defence mechanism. As the reader, I also found peace when I was outside of what Annae was feeling, just a passenger in someone else’s life. And isn’t that literature in the first place, a way of escapism?
I will admit, however, that the first half works better than the last, the premise being too vast for what the ending can achieve, but it is so well written (Isaac Fellman’s writing is mesmerizing, hypnotic), that it does not end with a sour taste, just the feeling of emptiness, of maybe having lost some meaning along the way.
Did I like the story? I am still debating with myself, trying to disentangle the message that I know I must be missing. It is a mixed feeling. Would I recommend the book? I will definitely try, and maybe it will be for selfish reasons, because I want to talk about it with someone else, see if they found something different. I definitely need a catharsis for these last days of reading.