What a strange and wonderous little book. I'm writing this review in that suspended space between finishing the book and having too many solidified opinions about it, because this book exists in suspension, in liminality, in a way that so few stories successfully do. How does one conceive of such a plot? I only know that Susanna Clarke seemingly reached deep into my subconscious to do so, which also contains halls of marble and columns and the roar of wild oceans. This book is confusing and purposely withholding. It holds the wonderment of a child and the weight of living in the world. It is a delightful matryoshka of images and revelations, and can, I think, only be read properly while letting yourself go to that place of childhood where everything is magic and nothing is real.