I’m not sure what I was expecting when I picked up this book, but it wasn’t that.
Piranesi lives in a house of never ending marble halls. Unique statues, some small, some gigantic, decorate every hall; from the faun playing pan pipes, to the eight giant minotaurs, and a myriad more. The lower floor is swept by oceans, the upper floor, in some places crumbling, reveals an endless sky. He lives alone, but is sometimes visited by the Other. That is until it seems there is someone else in the House…
![](https://caradocgames.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Piranesi-768x1024.jpg)
I don’t want to extrapolate on any of the details, because mystery and discovery are the beating lifeblood of this book. Discoveries about the House, about the Other, and most of all about Piranesi himself. It is an intriguing setting and cast of characters (if the characters number enough to be called a cast), and draws you in. Every line is beautifully written, and on every page some new detail of the House is revealed, and the story of Piranesi, the Other, and the visitor are slowly unpicked.
I’m not sure what I was expecting when I picked up this book, but it wasn’t that. Susanna Clarke’s previous book, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell, is a wonderful pseudo-historical fantasy novel, and while the quality of writing is the same, and there are echoes of faerie-like magic, Piranesi is a very different book. While Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell is an epic tale of highs and lows, of magic, bargains, trysts, trusts, and betrayals, Piranesi is a haunting mystery, a journey of discovery, a world of delight and wonder, but etched with melancholy and loss. I thoroughly enjoyed Piranesi, it is a fantastic book, very different from what I expected, and well worth checking out.