Gormenghast
- 511
- Pages
- about 9 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“Gormenghast” is a gothic coming-of-age story of rare strangeness, following Titus Groan from the age of seven to seventeen. Titus chafes against the castle’s inherited ritual and those who guard it, Barquentine and the young Steerpike, while a school subplot brings in Bellgrove and his colleagues. Some readers puzzled by the first book find that its tone finally comes into focus here. At over five hundred pages, it is a world to lose oneself in.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
Gormenghast is a fantasy novel by British writer Mervyn Peake, the second in his Gormenghast series. It is the story of Titus Groan, 77th Earl of Groan and Lord of Gormenghast Castle, from age 7 to 17. As the story opens, Titus dreads the pre-ordained life of ritual that stretches before him. To Titus, Master of Ritual Barquentine and his apprentice Steerpike are the embodiment of all he wants to rebel against. An important sub-plot involves Titus at school, where he encounters the professors, especially Bellgrove, who becomes Headmaster of Gormenghast school.
Reading order · Gormenghast trilogy
Full order & progress →- Titus GroanStart here
7.77.7 / 10 - GormenghastThis book
7.97.9 / 10 - Titus Alone
–Not ranked yet
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.8 across 56 ratings — not yet many, so the reader vote carries 28% of the weight and the rest pulls toward the Fantasy average of 8.0. That is how 7.9 comes out.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hardcover | 7.8 | 56 | 100% |
Frequently asked
How long is Gormenghast?
It has 511 pages — shorter than 57% of the ranked books in Fantasy.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
The same shelf — Fantasy — and a score of 7.9, the closest to this book.
