Susanna Clarke's imagination is truly astonishing. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell is one of my all-time favorite books, so my hopes for this one were high. I was not disappointed! Though they're very different books and questions abound at the start of Piranesi, I was drawn into the story and the sense that there was a deeper mystery unfolding here. An intriguing meditation on reality and memory, I was fully invested in Piranesi and his stories. This is one I'll be thinking about for a long time.

Don't read about this book before starting, just start reading. I really believe you'll enjoy this book the most if you don't read descriptions about what it's about. I loved it and I think that is because I was thrown into a fascinating new place with an unreliable narrator. A lot of the enjoyment for me was the amazing setting and the slow revealing of information about what is going on. I highly recommend this one.

This book was so unique. The parallel universe was fascinating, though following all of the halls and vestibules was exhausting at times. All of the characters were interesting, and I enjoyed their interactions. The ending was very sweet, and understanding between Piranesi and James Ritter was really touching.

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

Piranesi is the long-awaited new book by Susanna Clarke, published 15 years after her international bestseller Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. Piranesi's subject and feel is a departure from her first book, but it is by no means less brilliant and captivating. Clarke shows her skill of beautiful world building and creating characters that one feels like they know and will miss when the tale is ended.
The story of Piranesi and the House is both haunting and beautiful. I could tell fairly early on what was happening, but it in no way diminished the joy and thrill of seeing how it all played out. The end had a bittersweet feel that left me wanting to stay with the characters longer and continue to converse with them.
I cannot recommend this book highly enough!

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke will be published on September 15, 2020.

Thank you to Bloomsbury Publishing for this ARC.

This is one of the most cinematic books I have ever read. It is a feat of imagination. Be prepared to expand your mind a little before you start this. It challenges perceptions of reality and identity. It's going to take you to another world of labyrinth halls, marbles statues and sweeping tides of sea. What a pleasure to read. This book is a gift to readers everywhere.

As I may have mentioned twenty-two thousand times, I gave up magical thinking in 2019, and this was very smart of me because 2020 turned out to be a magical thinking minefield. Luckily I have a — actually, I have lost control of this metaphor and do not know what sort of a thing you’d use to protect against a minefield. I’m coming up all mine-sniffing animals, and I don’t want my very successful self-administered cognitive behavioral therapy to feel in any way connected with exploding rats or whatever. What I’m saying is, I am safe from the minefield of magical thinking that is 2019.

However, had I not given up magical thinking in 2019, I would have had to admit that it is not real when it was announced that Susanna Clarke had a new book coming out, because I admit that I have not kept the faith. In the last few years, I had said out loud to more than one person, “Susanna Clarke will only ever write one novel.” I had said, “But that’s okay! She has already given us perfection. I could not ask for more.” And that’s not the kind of attitude which (if magical thinking were real) gets you Piranesi in September 2020. What gets you Piranesi in September 2020 (if magical thinking were real) would be keeping the faith in spite of all the odds. Which I did not do. Which proves magical thinking doesn’t work.

Anyway, as you remember, Susanna Clarke wrote Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell way back in 2004, dayenu. And this year she wrote Piranesi, a pithy novel of a mere 272 pages about a man who lives alone (?) in an endless House comprising statues and floods and rotting things, and I really loved it.

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

The writing style of Piranesi isn’t tremendously similar to the writing style of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, because Susanna Clarke is a beautiful genius and I’ll fight you. What is similar is the fact that if you’re not enjoying the writing by about 10% of the way through the book, the book is probably not for you and you can move on to other pursuits. Piranesi (his name isn’t Piranesi) is extremely intelligent yet very innocent, and all you can think from very early on is “ack I want to protect this sweet marshmallow from his machinations, whatever they may be.”

This is fortunate, because Piranesi is a little slow to start, with a lot of descriptions of the House and the various floods, statuary, and bird life inside the House. I do not have a strong visual imagination, so this was very challenging for me — though not as challenging as it is for Piranesi, who is constantly mapping out the many rooms of the House and harvesting seaweed for food and taking tender care of the House’s dead. Also, I am frightened of floods. Also, his name isn’t Piranesi.

In all of this moody scene setting — which is by turns charming, sad, and funny — Clarke includes just enough discordant notes to make it clear that Piranesi, though recording with earnest accuracy his memories and impressions, is an unreliable narrator. He is a sweet, good cinnamon roll who trusts his friend (slash, the only person in the House besides Piranesi who is currently alive), but I do not require his input to know that I don’t trust this The Other character. I am touching my collarbone thinking about a later scene where Piranesi acquires some doubts about the value of this Secret Knowledge and tries to very sweetly bow out of acquiring it because he doesn’t want to dominate lesser intellects, actually.

As the book wears on, it gets creepier. (You will remember this technique from Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell and all those stories the gentleman with the thistledown hair tells to Stephen re: his own history. Really, anything relating to the gentleman with thistledown hair.) It’s partly creepy because Piranesi is so good and sweet and you don’t want this poor guy to have to keep eating seaweed; and it’s partly creepy because the House is full of water so everything’s wet all the time and wet things are creepier, as we all know; and it’s partly creepy because whilst there are fifteen people in the history of the world that Piranesi knows of, evidence begins to mount that the House might contain a sixteenth person too. You, an enemy to the Other because he’s an obvious butthead, will not be able to stop thinking about the question IS THE SIXTEENTH PERSON GOING TO SAVE PIRANESI OR WHAT?

So yeah! I loved it! Predictably, I loved it! More than anything, it reminded me of Elizabeth Hand’s Wylding Hall, in which everything is damp and there are a lot of dead birds. While it wasn’t exactly the haunted house story I was envisioning (so much wetter! so much more otherworldly!), it was nevertheless fucking creepy, yet tremendously sweet and charming. I cannot believe that we received this gift from Susanna Clarke after so many years.

Also, Piranesi discovers documentary evidence of things, and y’all know how I feel about documentary evidence.

Note: I received an e-ARC of Piranesi from the publisher, for review consideration. This has not impacted the contents of my review.

It has been days since I finished Piranesi, and I find I am still thinking about it. Absolutely exquisite writing, and unlike any other book I have read. My advice to readers- go into this book blind and let the world just open up for you. It is an absolutely magical, surreal book.

This is not a book for fantasy readers that want a standard fantasy novel. This is a book for literary fiction readers that don’t mind fantasy elements or for a fantasy reader that also likes literary fiction.
It’s fairly short and a quick read. There’s an amnesiac in a mysterious potentially infinite structure of vast halls half ruined filled with countless statues representing different things. The story unfolds the world to the reader bit by bit. It’s interestingly written.

Piranesi lives in a world that is an endless labyrinth of rooms perched at the edge of the sea and filled with statues and stairways and vast echoing chambers. He spends his days counting and cataloging the statues, fishing, and tending to the bones of the dead. Twice a week he meets with The Other, the only other living inhabitant of Piranesi’s world. This vivid and intriguing opening to a novel that is weird and wonderful leads us in directions we don’t expect, makes room for rumination on ritual and magic, on truth and knowledge, and the ways our beliefs can lead us either to salvation or ruin. The House is a world, is a prison, is a sanctuary, and is beautifully rendered. To say more would ruin the pleasure of winding through this murky, twisting labyrinth of a story, so go into this one with little in order to come out a little richer, a little more full of appreciation for beauty, and simplicity, and the sound of the sea.

Given her debut novel "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell," Susanna Clarke has attracted a great deal of anticipation for her new book "Piranesi." Her first book was a joy to read that drew many deserved accolades, a portrait of two magicians contesting in a world in which they reintroduced magic. The publicity copy for "Piranesi" suggested a book possibly much in the same vein:

Piranesi's house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house.

There is one other person in the house-a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.

After reading "Piranesi," my verdict is that it may prove a challenging book to anyone who is not already a fan of Clarke, and potentially a demanding novel for her fans as well. If one is willing to persist through its beginning, it unfolds in an intriguing manner, but it can prove taxing up until that point.

My opinion seems contrary to many of the novel's cover blurbs:

“Piranesi is a gorgeous, spellbinding mystery that gently unravels page by page. Precisely the sort of book that I love wordlessly handing to someone so they can have the pleasure of uncovering its secrets for themselves. This book is a treasure, washed up upon a forgotten shore, waiting to be discovered.” ―Erin Morgenstern, NYT bestselling author of THE STARLESS SEA and THE NIGHT CIRCUS

“What a world Susanna Clarke conjures into being, what a tick-tock-tick-tock of reveals, what a pure protagonist, what a morally-squalid supporting cast, what beauty, tension and restraint, and what a pitch-perfect ending. Piranesi is an exquisite puzzle-box far, far bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.” ―David Mitchell, New York Times bestselling author of CLOUD ATLAS

“Readers who accompany [Piranesi] as he learns to understand himself will see magic returning to our world. Weird and haunting and excellent.” ―Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review

“Clarke wraps a twisty mystery inside a metaphysical fantasy in her extraordinary new novel . . . Sure to be recognized as one of the year's most inventive.” ―Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

“As questions multiply and suspense mounts in this spellbinding, occult puzzle of a fable, one begins to wonder if perhaps the reverence, kindness, and gratitude practiced by Clarke's enchanting and resilient hero aren't all the wisdom one truly needs.” ―Booklist, Starred Review

These are excellent reviews, but I wonder if "Piranesi" would have gotten this stellar reception if it wasn't for memories of "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell."

Let me talk about the book itself. "Piranesi" reminds me most of James Stoddard's "The High House" and the rest of his Evenmere trilogy, as well as Jorge Luis Borges' "The Library of Babel." (There are echoes of many other works of Borges in “Piranesi,” most obviously “The House of Asterion” and “Labyrinths.”) Both "The High House" and "The Library of Babel" are about characters trapped in buildings with infinite interiors — the latter carries with it a hint of madness and despair that is also seen in "Piranesi." All three feel reminiscent to me of authors such as Lord Dunsany — what fantasy used to be like before Tolkien and Howard.

The name of the novel refers most likely to Giovanni Battista Piranesi, an Italian artist famous for his striking engravings of Rome and of "Imaginary Prisons." One cannot help but inspect his art and picture its dramatic spaces while reading "Piranesi" — an imposing atmosphere Clarke supports with her words. (Giovanni Battista Piranesi’s son, Francesco Piranesi, similarly created beautiful engravings depicting monuments and ancient temples.)

At first "Piranesi" is quite promising — it opens with fascinating, odd characters and haunting, engrossing halls. However, as the novel unfolds, the uncanny nature of the characters and setting take on a disturbing edge, as if the world and its people have lost their minds. The protagonist seems to have no past and no memory. Conversations, when they do occur, can feel disconcerting and laced with dread. Objects appear mysteriously. It can all feel like a fever dream.

For the first third of the book, "Piranesi" can feel very lonely. Not much happens for long stretches of time. The protagonist observes and muses, but does very little, and for the most part, has no one to interact with. It reminded me of a cross between Tom Hanks' "Castaway" and much of David Lynch's oeuvre. If that's your jams — and for many people, that is — then you'll enjoy this part of the novel. Others might find it difficult not dropping this book.

Eventually the story takes a turn. Drama and answers enter the picture. The ideas that Clarke presents are fascinating ones, the character decisions and dialogue intriguing and rewarding. But it takes about a third of the book — 90 pages — to reach this point. Moreover, although the protagonist’s reactions to these discoveries are understandable, I also found them somewhat annoying. Still, the book does build to a series of satisfying revelations. It ends well enough.

All in all, “Piranesi” is a very different book from "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell." I found it intriguing and difficult, in places vexing and dull. If not for Clarke’s reputation, I find it difficult to believe “Piranesi” would have survived in this form to publication. As is, I do think dedicated readers will find it worthwhile to champion. I see it spawning arguments over its merits, and perhaps that’s what art should try and do sometimes.

Audacious and challenging, Piranesi isn't a quick read, but it is an outstanding one. It's a,novel that charms as it makes you question just about everything. It's a tour de force of imagination and ingenuity and I loved it, even as I'm not sure I'm smart enough to have picked up everything Susanna Clarke wanted me to see. For readers who like a read that's magical, yet connected to the everyday, along with a walloping dose of gorgeous writing and a challenging and intense plot. Very highly recommended.

Fans of Susanna Clarke have been waiting 16 years for a new novel, whereas George R. R. Martin fans have been tapping their toes for only nine. "Piranesi" is worth the wait: like "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell" it is a true original, reminiscent of "The Magus" by John Fowles, with nods to "Pan's Labyrinth" and C. S. Lewis's Narnia series.

In the first entry in this epistolary novel, we meet proud and humble Piranesi, contentedly exploring a vast, otherworldly labyrinth full of statues which is partly submerged in ocean waves. While observing the tides that sweep through the halls, Piranesi keeps a meticulous diary of "scientific findings," events, and rituals.

Small disturbances and inconsistencies begin to creep into the novel as Piranesi reveals that Piranesi is not his name (he can't remember his name) and that he worships the labyrinth, which he calls The House, as a god. A Mephistophelian companion appears on a strikingly regular schedule who has no name: Piranesi simply calls him the Other, and the Other is the only living human being that Piranesi recalls ever having known. The Other has given Piranesi his name, which implies that the labyrinth is a prison (Piranesi was an Italian artist who made etchings of labyrinthine prisons). The Other is seeks "a Great and Secret Knowledge" that will give him enormous power.

Piranesi describes his suffering and deprivation in what seems at first to be a kind of paradise. The Other, Piranesi's beloved captor and magus, is evil, but the Other has a mysterious magus of his own. When facts about Piranesi and "the Other" come to light, Piranesi discovers that his "rational mind" of which he is so proud has been keeping all of the evidence about his life and identity hidden in plain sight.

Clarke makes brilliant use of narrative distance and an unreliable narrator to create slowly dawning horror and to layer mystery upon mystery, followed by a cascade of revelations like a labyrinth-sweeping tide. While masquerading as an escapist fantasy, "Piranesi" explores the extreme lengths to which the human mind will go to make sense and order out of chaos and terror. I was intoxicated, disturbed, and satisfied by this psychedelic trip of a novel.

I received an advanced readers copy of this book from Netgalley and the publisher and was encouraged to submit a review.

Fans of House of Leaves would enjoy this read. Easier than the previous book it serves as a beautiful tale of discovering who you are within the world, no matter what world that is.

Oh dear. Susanna Clarke's first novel is probably my favourite novel of the 20th century so you can probably guess the eagerness with which I read the new one, especially after such a long time. Quite frankly, it's a disappointment. The plot is a fairly interesting mystery but it's far less immersive piece of literature than I had aniticipated. It's not a poor book by any stretch of the imagination but the brilliant piece of work that is it's predecessor.

Piranesi is the strange fantasy tale I was looking for. After a few pages of wondering where exactly the story had landed me, and adjusting to the voice of the narrator, I was absolutely sold. It's odd, right from the start, but don't mistake odd for bad or uninteresting. It's a perfect kind of odd - as a reader I had been transplanted to a mysterious house filled with countless hallways, vestibules, and remarkable statues, and I couldn't gain a sense of when the story was occurring. Add to this pile of intrigue, the fact that our narrator is completely alone in this mystical, surreal realm, aside from one other person who seems to have a questionable agenda.

I roamed the halls with Piranesi. I learned of all the statues, and the birds, and slowly found myself learning more and more, until I couldn't resist knowing all of the details. Each piece of Piranesi's puzzle unfolded with perfect timing and impeccable precision. The mystery was paced in such away that it only enhanced the setting. And all of it led to a completely satisfying conclusion. I know I'll revisit Piranesi and his house all over again.

I can't wait to recommend this to readers.

This has to be the most unusual and difficult book to pin a genre on and that makes it glorious. Piranesi is a caretaker of sorts of an elaborate multi-level, multi-wing, multi corridor dwelling that seems to go on forever. Each hall is filled with statues that reminded me a bit of that weird house in Game of Thrones - The House of Black and White. There is no real way of telling time other than the one that Piranesi has developed but he is given some guidance and notice of disasters during his meetings with THE OTHER (all knowing big man in charge). Piranesi becomes aware of another who he is forbidden to talk to but starts communicating with anyway and falls deeper down the Alice in Wonderland rabbit hole. Reading this book you begin to take on the role of an anthropologist studying a new culture searching for clues. It is a wonderful unique romp down a rabbit hole and Piranesi is instantly endearing. Fans of Erin Morganstern will enjoy the twists. My thanks to the publisher for the advance copy.

Piranesi is an explorer of the labyrinthine house—with its endless corridors, thousands of statues and an ocean within its walls. He has learned to thrive there fishing in the lower halls, keeping his detailed journals, and calculating the tides. The only other living human is the Other who visits twice a week researching secret knowledge held by the house. But there is more to the story, and more to Piranesi, than he knows and as it unravels a chilling truth begins to emerge. This is a wonderful fantastic mystery with a creepy edge to it. Fans of Erin Morgenstern or Alix E. Harrow should run for this one.

Piranesi is a creation of another world: in this world, there are vast, endless halls with flowing rapids, towering marble statues, and birds that speak to him. And of course there’s The Other, the only other living inhabitant of the House that convenes with Piranesi twice a week to better understand the contents of this world and its greater purpose. Piranesi, like The Other, is a man of reason, seeking only to catalogue the limitless and awe-inspiring landscape that his benevolent world hosts. What should happen, then, when Piranesi’s intimacy with this world offers him a perspective that no longer aligns with The Other’s? When evidence indicates someone new has visited the House, can his perceptions of his world continue to hold?

Like Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, one of Clarke’s primary interests in this novel is the development of a new type of world organized around magic. The reader enters the novel with a strong sense of displacement from their own world, beginning with a new calendar punctuated by events to which Piranesi holds significance. The first chapter reads much like the biblical creation story in its ordering of events: “First came the Tide from the Far Eastern Halls…Next came the Tide from the Western Halls” (and so on). Clarke, or Piranesi, has believably installed a new world order unlike any the reader has ever witnessed.

In many ways, this novel reads like a short story in long form; while the actual events that move the plot forward are few, the reader delights in such details as the index that Piranesi keeps in his journals that, when revisited, create a comprehensive collection of events that have contributed to his current station in the House. Piranesi’s uniquely insular perspective leads the narrative through a series of these entries that give an academic weight to the otherwise unexplainable – where fantastic events are made legible, words such as “police station” and “Manchester” are rendered meaningless within the House.

While I could say that I would’ve liked more from this story, Clarke’s inimitable ability to develop otherworldly magical histories is enough to entice readers to give this (and her previous works) a hearty chance.

Much thanks to Bloomsbury USA and Netgalley for this incredibly unique read!

Piranesi

This was weird in a delightful way.

Piranesi lives in a large building/mansion. It's in the middle of the ocean. Piranesi has to remember which of its countless rooms flood at which time. There is man he calls The Other that lives there with him. However, Piransei's memories aren't perfect and then someone leaves a message for Piranesi, that makes him question how he got there and what his name really is.

The oddness of this world was very fascinating to explore. There are rooms, statues, and birds (along with bird crap) everywhere. You know that this place isn't right but Piranesi finding out the true nature of this world is like unwrapping a present bit by bit.

I was not expecting this book. I never read Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, so I went into this barely knowing Susanna Clarke's name.

This atmospheric triumph leaves the reader just as uncertain as the protagonist, where its (very few) characters are all unreliable in some way or another. In fewer than 300 pages, Clarke builds a world that you can feel all around you, that is a character all its own, and is just as unreliable as all the others.

I'll be recommending this to anyone looking for something a little different that will stay with you for weeks afterward.