Ever in search of his next adventure, Quentin sails out to Fillory's far reaches to collect back taxes - a simple enough task that lands him back on earth with no way to return. 
 In the last book, the narrative followed Quentin fairly closely. Here, however, our time is split between the present, where Quentin & co quest to save magic in the multiverse, and filling in Julia's doings between Quentin leaving for Brakebills and their reunion. 
 The back-and-forthing is an annoying narrative style and I hate it. I'm not sure what Grossman might have done differently, given the important information that Julia's storyline gives us, but it's irritating to start getting into the groove of one storyline only to be ripped out of it at every chapter end. I was enjoying both, but the transition pain was just too frequent. 
 Julia's story is an interesting one. It's much more rushed than Quentin's in the first book, but it resonated for me in a lot of ways. It certainly wasn't an easy read, though, as it's clearly modelled on addiction (and includes symptomatic behaviours and great heapings of depression). Unfortunately, it goes even further and includes rape. (view spoiler)[Why was the rape necessary? In similar positions, rape was never on the table for Quentin, so why did Julia's 'price to be paid' have to be this? Grossman could have done anything to Julia to bring her to her lowest, and he chose the easy route of having her raped. I'm quickly losing patience for rape being the default bad thing that can happen to a female character, especially when male characters in identical situations are almost never raped. (hide spoiler)]