REVIEW: Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

As you can see from all the awards this book was nominated for, Piranesi is almost universally loved. It has a 4.27 on Goodreads and a 4.5 on Amazon, with over 140k ratings. I believe it was the overall highest rated book I read this year. I picked it up because it was the May read for BookswithEmilyFox's Patreon. I don't want to say that this book was massively hyped, but I'd be lying. I haven't loved a lot of magical realism books, but based off the synopsis I thought this would be one that I liked.

SUMMARY

This book is written in a series of Piranesi's journal entries However, unlike days, months, and years as we know them, Piranesi writes his journal entries using days and months, but with the years being marked by a significant event that happened. We enter on 'The year the albatross came to the south-western halls'. Piranesi is told in seven parts, each focusing on a different person except one that is named for an event in the book. It follows Piranesi as he documents his days helping a figure known as "the Other" in his research. He doesn't really know much about why he is there or even to the extent of the labyrinth he is in. One day he learns of another person who makes him question who he is and if he can trust the Other.

MY THOUGHTS

The structure of the journal entries I actually enjoyed quite a lot. I love unique structures when they fit with the overall plot. If a book is going to use journal entries at least make it a make sense of why. This absolutely did that. The beginning of the book is so incredibly slow, though. Parts one and two are basically long descriptions of Piranesi's surroundings with little to no plot. I really thought I was going to end up DNFing it but things finally started to get interesting once the figure known as 'the Prophet' emerges.

In part three, the discovery of the journals starts an very interesting mystery. I really liked the way that Clarke built up suspense because Piranesi didn't know anymore than the reader. I sometimes get annoyed when the reader is given too much information that the main characters don't know about. I think it ruins reveals and creates this feeling of lower stakes. It also somewhat gives away the ending because all I'm waiting for is the moment that the character finds out what the reader already knows. The way Piranesi was written in this part made me wish the beginning wasn't so slow. I was actively trying to figure out who Piranesi was and where he was trapped. We were given bits and pieces of the mystery and I was just waiting for the reveal that, judging on the reviews, was amazing.

But then the next part completely ruined any subtlety. It gave everything away and felt sort of lazy to me. Like Clarke had built up all this suspense and then gave everything away in less than five pages. The main character made a completely dumb decision that made me want to scream "this is why you tell people where you're going!" The ending was so anticlimactic. There was one scene where everything came to fruition and the next thirty or so pages was just boring slog of wrapping up loose ends. There was no payoff with the character known as 'the Prophet'. He may as well have not even been in the book to begin with. I thought that the labyrinth would at least be explained. Where was it? How do they get in and out? Why is it there? What are the statues? But instead Piranesi just ended.

I was so underwhelmed by a vast majority of this book. There were entertaining parts but I'm very surprised that so many people like it as much as they do. And to be nominated for the Hugo, Nebula, Locus, and World Fantasy Award? I don't understand. I am very much in the minority here so if you loved this book, no hate, it just is the definition of 'not my type'.

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