Piranesi

‘Batter-Sea is not a word,’ I said at last. ‘It has no referent. There is nothing in the World corresponding to that combination of sounds.’

Perhaps that is what it is like being with other people. Perhaps even people you like and admire immensely can make you see the World in ways you would rather not.

As if merit was a function of chronology!

In my mind are all the tides

The body of Valentine Ketterley, magician and scientist

Piranesi wants to say: But I need the thing you have, so why don’t you just give it to me? And then when I have something you need, I will just give it to you. This would be a simpler system and much better!

This, I suppose, is where I differ from both of them – from Matthew Rose Sorensen and Piranesi;

Matthew Rose Sorensen has reappeared

Valentine Ketterley has disappeared

As the Shadows fell in the First Vestibule Raphael returned