From the New York Times bestselling author of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, an intoxicating, hypnotic new novel 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.

How do you write about a book that’s impossible to describe?

When it comes to Piranesi, there’s so little that I can actually say. You have to read this and let it unravel itself to you. Knowing anything in advance would take so much away from the reading experience.

What I can say is this:

A man lives alone in an endless House, with halls and vestibules that seem to stretch on forever. Outside the House, as seen from its windows, are the sun and moon and stars. Inside there are clouds and birds, and on the lower levels, the sea and its rising and falling tides. The House is filled with statues, all depicting different people and creatures.

Also in the House are the remains of 13 people. There’s also the Other — an older man whom the main characters visits with twice a week, who refers to the main character as Piranesi. As far as Piranesi is concerned, the 15 people — two alive, thirteen dead — are all the people in the entire world.