Staff Pick
This book is simple and stunning, elegant and totally engrossing. The author of the famous Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell has once again created something brilliant and memorable, and I was captivated with Piranesi from the start. A perfect read for any season! Recommended By Marianne T, Powells.com
This is the kind of book I love: dreamlike and a bit esoteric, all about the ways we exist in the world and relate to each other. I felt myself pulled into these mysterious hallways just as the titular character is, and it stayed with me like the best dreams do. Recommended By Alice H., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
New York Times Bestseller
Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction
World Fantasy Awards Finalist
The instant New York Times bestselling novel from the author of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, an intoxicating, hypnotic book set in a dreamlike alternative reality.
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.
For readers of Neil Gaiman's The Ocean at the End of the Lane and fans of Madeline Miller's Circe, Piranesi introduces an astonishing new world, an infinite labyrinth, full of startling images and surreal beauty, haunted by the tides and the clouds.
Review
"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)
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)
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)
About the Author
Susanna Clarke is the author of the The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories and the New York Times bestseller and Hugo Award-winning Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. She lives in England.