And I know I said about the last one too, but as evidenced, I’m clearly allowed to change my opinion.įor those of you reading this, but somehow unfamiliar with the plot, I shall extrapolate thusly: Harry Potter, fourteen-year-old wizard, is stuck at the house of his non-magical aunt and uncle, almost starving and desperate to get back to school. I don’t quite know what made me say such a thing as a simple reread as told me that, actually, this is probably my favourite. I mention this because I recently found an old, short review I made on Shelfari where I declared Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire my least favourite of the Potter series. Other times you can realise you’ve been an utter fool. Sometimes you can look back at something you’ve done or said and be proud of it. “The villagers of Little Hangleton still called it ‘the Riddle House’, even though it had been many years since the Riddle family had lived there.” If you just want more reviews, guide yourself around my blog with the navigation bar and find hundreds of reviews at your fingertips. Looking for something else? Try my novels, The Atomic Blood-Stained Bus (the story of a cannibal and an ex-god) and The Third Wheel (a comedic alien invasion tale), test yourself with a quiz from my book Questioning Your Sanity, or visit my website and I’ll cultivate you a whole quiz on whatever subjects you like. This House is as mysterious and impenetrable as literary houses that have come before it, like Slade House, or the House of Leaves – and if Clarke’s purpose is simply to unsettle, than she’s achieved that with aplomb. The resolutions are as bizarre as everything that’s come before. Towards the novel’s end, we begin to find out the truth about Piranesi and the House, although I’m not actually sure whether we fully do. All this adds to the eerieness of the setting. While the House is apparently endless, with no outside space or way to escape, there are still windows, and rooms flood one by one. With the House being full of statues, they are aware of things like minotaurs, kings, chess, familial relationships, fauns and beehives, but they appear never to have seen a garden, understand what the words “police station” mean, or have any concept of the years (although we also learn that their location might not be as far removed from ours as we first think). We learn only what Piranesi seems to know, and what they know is often quite strange. This is a truly bizarre piece of fiction, but very interesting for that. And then he discovers that his own diaries might not be as truthful as he once thought, and the House suddenly becomes a thing of danger. Unsure whether they mean good or ill, Piranesi must decide whether to hunt them down, or leave them alone. When he discovers some writing on the wall of one of the rooms, he realises that there’s someone else in the House. Piranesi can’t seem to find a way out though. His only contact is with the Other, a figure who also comes to the House, but doesn’t seem to live there. Spending his days wandering and exploring the endless halls, corridors and vestibules of the House, he catalogues the statues he finds, catches fish in the flooded basements, and leaves offerings at the skeletons of those who came before him. Piranesi lives in the House, and perhaps he always has. So where does one put Piranesi? Not fantasy enough to be fantasy, but not real enough to be literary. And that’s before we even get into the Thursday Next series, which seem to be fantasy, science fiction, romance, mystery and crime all at the same time. Stephen King is so well known for horror that his other books that are more fantasy or science fiction will still be shoved in the Horror section of a bookshop. The Time Traveler’s Wife has science fiction elements, but is generally regarded as literary. The Lord of the Rings has a fantasy setting, but is a quest story. “When the Moon rose in the Third Northern Hall I went to the Ninth Vestiblue to witness the joining of three Tides.”
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