True to the name, the first course is served at midnight. First, the guests are friends, but the invitation to a Dinner becomes a sort of highly coveted prize.
There are no menus, but the food is always of amazing quality.
Chandresh is obsessed with creating an air of "nocturnal mystery", so the settings, mannerisms, and food reflects that as much as possible.
And then comes a description of the dessert that I suggest you don't read while hungry.
"The desserts are always astonishing. Confections deliriously executed in chocolate in butterscotch, berries bursting with creams and liqueurs. Cakes layered to impossible heights, pastries lighter than air. Figs that drip with honey, sugar blown into curls and flowers."
I can just imagine getting the invitation to one of these dinners, and just getting horribly sick/full while eating, and you have to sit and watch the other people stuff their faces with the prettiest food ever.
Anyway, more fluff about the extravagance: decor, entertainment, etc., etc.
The Midnight Dinner that is the focus of this chapter introduces us to the people who will run the Night Circus...oh, I'm sorry, Le Cirque des Reves:
Mme. Ana Padva- a ballerina. Not exactly sure what she does; not a very important character.
Mr. Ethan W. Barris- an engineer/architect. Most likely designed certain aspects of the circus.
Tara and Lainie Burgess- the "twins" every large group apparently has, who apparently "do a little bit of everything", which means they don't do anything.
And of course, the man in the grey suit, who is now, infuriatingly to my grammar quirks, is now known as "Mr. A. H-", because a period cannot contain his name, which, chances are, is not his actual name.
There are some other people important to the story, but I'm not exactly sure when they come in. Marco is serving as Chandresh's assistant.
They talk and eat, so on and so on, and when they finish dinner around two in the morning, they get down to business, talking in the stereotypical "I'm incredibly rich, much more than you" sort of way, drinking brandy and coffee on couches and armchairs.
Chandresh describes his plan for the circus, and here I need to put in another long quote:
"'It is merely in conceptual stages, and that is why I ask you all here now, for the inception and development. What it needs is style, panache. Ingenuity in its engineering and structure. To be infused with the mesmerizing, and perhaps a touch of mystery. I believe you are the proper group for this undertaking. If any of you disagree, you are welcome to leave but I respectfully request you speak of this to no one. I prefer that these plans be kept undisclosed entirely, at least for now. Very sensitive at this point, after all.'"
This chapter ends with another three-to-four hours' worth of the group poring over the charts and diagrams and writing twice as many new ones.
Chapter Ten should be out by next Sunday.
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