And the Winner of the 2024 Booker Prize is…

A novel contemplating the state of humanity wins!

Daye Lindsay
2 min readNov 15, 2024

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Photo by Tony Litvyak on Unsplash

The Winner

On November 12, Samantha Harvey accepted the UK’s most prestigious literary award, the Booker Prize, for her fifth novel Orbital. This 130-page story follows a single day when six astronauts — four men and two women from Japan, the United States, Britain, Italy, and Russia, gather on board the International Space Station. While orbiting Earth, they contemplate existential questions about God and humanity and share philosophical thoughts on such topics as man’s place in the cosmos, our planet's beauty, and our world's fragility in the face of climate change.

Orbital beat out the following short-listed contenders for the prize:

  • The Safe Keep by Yael van der Wouden.
  • James by Percival Everett
  • Held by Anne Michaels.
  • Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood
  • Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner.

Harvey received a trophy and a £50,000 cash prize, while the other authors each received £2,500.

Who Should Read Orbital?

If you love beautiful and imaginative prose, what are you waiting for? You’ll love Orbital. Here is an…

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Daye Lindsay
Daye Lindsay

Written by Daye Lindsay

I'm a book reviewer and aspiring author dedicated to building a community by sharing my love for books and offering tips for new writers and creatives.

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