The Booker Prize ceremony has just taken place and the novel Orbital by Samantha Harvey has been announced as the 2024 winner! The Booker Prize was founded in 1969 as a way to award the best fiction of the year. It was originally just open to Commonwealth countries, however in recent years it has opened to everyone and aims to “reward the finest in fiction”. The organisation says that the winning book is “a work that not only speaks to our current times but also one that will endure and join the pantheon of great literature.” Not only does the winning author gain success and growing fame, but also a prize of £50,000.
Harvey’s novel follows six astronauts living on the International Space Station. The book spans a 24-hour period and follows them as they orbit the earth 16 times. This novel is the second shortest book to win this prize, coming in at 136 pages. On accepting the award, Harvey dedicated the prize to “everyone who speaks for and against the Earth, for and not against the dignity of other humans, other life, and all the people who speak for, and call for, and work for peace.”
It is also important to note the other shortlisted books. Any of these books could have won and achieved the same standard as Harvey’s novel. For instance, James by Percival Everett, is a reimagining of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of Huck’s companion Jim. This novel could be considered the runner-up, many people guessing that this would be the winner. The other novels shortlisted include Held by Anne Michaels; Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner; Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood; and The Safe Keep by Yael Van der Wouden. (The Booker Prize has compiled the synopses and reviews of these books here if you wish to look into the runners-up in more depth).
The Booker Prize prides itself on celebrating the very best of literature published in the United Kingdom.
It is difficult to decide if the book that was chosen deserves to be the winner over all the other books shortlisted. The Booker Prize prides itself on celebrating the very best of literature published in the United Kingdom and it does not disappoint; every one of these shortlisted books could have won the prize and truly deserved it! Edmund de Waal, chair of the judges, stated that all of the shortlisted books are “books that made us want to keep on reading, to ring up friends and tell them about them, novels that inspired us to write.”
The Booker Prize is one of the ways we can celebrate great fiction and expand our TBR lists even more. Harvey’s novel did deserve the prize, and the same can be said for every other shortlisted book. All these books are phenomenal reads; I would encourage you to pick up any one of them! Moving onto 2025, it will be interesting to see the future novels that make it onto this list.
Harvey’s novel did deserve the prize, and the same can be said for every other shortlisted book.
