Mathematics becomes metaphor in first-time novelist Giordano’s story about the life-altering capabilities of choice and consequence. Though the introspections of its characters are romanticised to a degree, The Solitude of Prime Numbers is a realistic take on what it is to be human in that it does not pander to those seeking tidy happy endings. Instead, it juxtaposes the precision of numerical calculation with the many imperfections of existence.

Prime numbers are those that are divisible by only themselves or one. They do not fit with others. Enter Mattia and Alice, a pair of outsiders who the novel suggests are like twin primes, or primes only separated by one other number. Close but untouchable. Linked but never joined. Whether this will be the ultimate fate of Mattia and Alice forms the narrative momentum of the novel.

Despite each possessing secret tragedies in their pasts, withdrawn self-harmer Mattia and reticent, anorexic Alice seem good, if never quite perfect, for each other. There does indeed always seem to be something or someone in the way of their shared happiness, whether it is a high school queen bee or the spectres of past misdeeds and shames. Although meaningful communication between the couple is at an impasse for much of the novel, bridled by these secret shames, moments with the potential to unfetter their inhibitions and change their lives forever do occasionally occur. It is their choices whether or not to act in these rare moments that will determine their fates. As Giordano tells us, “choices are made in a few seconds and paid for in the time that remains.”

The effect of decisions, and the paths this leads characters down, is also portrayed through the novel’s peripheral characters and sub stories. Explored for a moment and then cast aside, like so much chaff, secondary characters largely ebb away from Mattia and Alice. Not only does this heighten the isolation of the couple, it also mirrors real life. A lingering look at a character that leads nowhere comes to feel like a red herring, but occurs to make a valid point: people do not fit in neatly with the plots of life, but drift around and away, even the most cherished sometimes becoming insignificant with time and tide.

It is this lack of control over life, regardless of who or what we are, that makes a fear of making decisions, or putting oneself forward, seem all the more foolish. Ironically, the novel suggests, some avoidable disappointments occur through inaction, an inaction which is itself caused by a fear of consequences. Through Mattia and Alice’s early cataclysmic decisions to act and their later avoidance of and trepidation around active decisions, The Solitude of Prime Numbers explores the fear caused by “the weight of consequences”. It posits the need to learn to live with life and its disappointments, its imperfections, and highlights the importance of letting the embers of the could-have-beens fizzle out.

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