The Mookse and the Gripes discussion
Booker Prize for Fiction
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2024 Booker Prize Shortlist Discussion
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Paul wrote: "I suspect it isn’t the author But the compère of the evening, who definitely would have known the result, follows the account. It may be that she created it?"
Someone who created the account or who has access to it.
It is a lovely book and quite original. I'm happy with any book other than Creation Lake or The Safekeep winning, so I got my wish. I still feel a bit bad for Everett, though.
I thought this article in The Independent by Martin Chilton was well worth reading (and captured many of my own views):https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-en...
Robert wrote: "I guess we’re different: I’m still reflecting on Orbital 3 months after reading it. I loved the fragility from topics to prose. Just a personal thing. I really don’t like it when people say that ..."
Well I suppose I could launch into a discussion around the arbitrary nature of this kind of cultural gatekeeping and how it relates to particular taste groups, assumptions about aesthetics, the nature of the literary. Or I could respond in kind and say that there's a difference between merit and perceived merit. Or I could say that we all should know by now that committees of this kind are often as much invested in reaching a workable consensus as they're about identifying the strongest contender in literary terms. But, ultimately, I'm not invested enough in the Booker to really care that much about who did/didn't win. Although at least one other person agreed with me before they mysteriously deleted their comment!
Robert wrote: "Just a personal thing. I really don’t like it when people say that other books deserved more. The judges made their decision. There was merit that we’re not seeing and that’s that."Well the judges are just 5 people, not always selected for their well-known credentials as literary critics. So I think it's wrong to assume that they must have seem some special merit in a book that isn't obvious to rest of us because of their lengthy considerations and expertise.
But if we're saying the prize is ultimately awarded to the book that the appointed jury consider best meets what they were looking for, then yes almost by definition the book that wins deserves to win.
And ultimately that's what any book prize is - the decision of the jury chosen to judge it.
I'd still make an exception for them excluding Praiseworthy though - that's objectively a massive mistake :-)
Incidentally rumour (*) that the judge who leaked it to Harvey did so to bounce the others into the decision.(* which I have just started)
I would be surprised if this was (as has happened on the Booker) a year when this was a compromise choice - with groups of judges championing different books but refusing to support the favourite of the other groups. We have known for nearly a year what Justine Jordan thinks of Orbital - and last night earlier in the ceremony (pre You Tube I think) Sara Collins was talking about a book where she added a post it note that “This is a book we need now, but it may also be a book we’ll need forever.” - and we know now from the Guardian article it was Orbital.
That article I think also makes it clear what life circumstances the judges were living through (which is where the subjectivity comes in). Based on that (just as with the sentiments of the winner announcement) I think you clearly get to either Held or Orbital being the winner.
The judges this year always talked about two criteria - re-readability and the book you would want to press into someone’s hand and say they must read it …. and while the first is why I thought Held had a great chance; in their interviews since it’s clearly the second that they used to pick the winner (which means Orbital - much as I loved Held I can’t imagine recommending it to many people - at the event on Monday I was talking to some well known bloggers and people who are at the Booker events every year and even the ones who loved Held did not get whole chunks of it).
I would have picked Held but much prefer Orbital as a Booker winner to James (although I liked that book more). It’s over to the US prizes now to deliver for Everett.
But for the UK’s biggest litfic prize this is a great choice
Orbital was a lukewarm read for me in September, due to its much too slow pace at times, although it had some fantastic metaphors that stayed with me.What made it shine, though, was the absolutely stunning chapter called 'Orbit 13' that interweaves the secular/scientific cosmogony measured in millions of years with the personal, more metaphysical calendar year. That passage is one of the best literary texts I've ever read. For that section alone it was well worth the prize.
Also, I think in these war- and agenda-torn times of ours, it was the best choice that was understandably preferred to the other shortlisted narratives that - without my having read any of them but partially the Kushner - seem to address the usual personal and historic dramas more specifically. The jury's choice for any frontal approach to sensitive subjects could have deepened the conflicts between the various ideological sides these days. Orbital's meditative, non-focused tone is rather comforting in this context, so I increased my rating for it after re-skimming it last night.
Yes, the prize goes to the book that particular jury felt was the best. A different jury would probably have produced a different winner. And another, yet another winner. Another shortlist. Another longlist.Orbital is a good book with many beautiful, even gorgeous, passages. It's creative. I have to echo GY and say I would not recommend Held to many people, but I also would not recommend Orbital to many, either. I guess more than Held. Of course, Held was, by far and away, my very favorite. I fell in love with that book the minute I read it.
Orbital is topical since mankind is knowingly, for the most part, destroying the Earth with bad habits that are, hopefully, still reversible. (But probably won't be.) Didn't someone call Orbital a "love letter to the Earth?" It is that.
I liked Orbital, I loved Held. The one I will reread multiple times is Held.
As for James, I'm hoping it wins the Pulitzer. Really hoping. If anyone has earned it, it's Percival Everett.
The book I enjoyed reading most after Held wasn't even on the shortlist: Enlightenment, though I felt it would have been stronger without the Maria element.
Anna wrote: "Orbital was a lukewarm read for me in September, due to its much too slow pace at times, although it had some fantastic metaphors that stayed with me.What made it shine, though, was the absolutel..."
Great comments
Interestingly I have seen Orbit13 criticised in Insta reviews (some of which were reposted today) for being rather derivative of Carl Sagan (who of course was referenced in the acceptance speech). I don’t know if that is fair.
I bought Orbital for my middle daughter who read it before me (I read her copy post Orwell) - so I have already recommended it to others I guess.
Bella (Kiki) wrote: "Orbital is topical since mankind is knowingly, for the most part, destroying the Earth with bad habits that are, hopefully, still reversible. (But probably won't be.) Didn't someone call Orbital a "love letter to the Earth?" It is that."Interesting! Although it was of course an obvious one, the environmental topic didn't come through in my reading, or at least it didn't dominate it. What struck me was how all our myths and knowledge are created and acquired from our terrestrial perspective. Even the millions of years we use when we speak of the age of the universe are based on our terrestrial understanding of 'year' or - more pronounced in the book - 'day'. All this becomes so relative out there in space where the sun comes 'up' and goes 'down' more than once a what we call day.
A book I’d recommend to lots of people is pretty low down my criteria for what ought to win finest fiction literary prizes - indeed disqualifying. But that’s why I and the Booker don’t get along. Incidentally there are suggestions on X that the Samantha Harvey account was created by the same person who created the fake Han Kang one (although in that case he didn’t do it two hours before she won) and also today has faked a publisher’s account to announce that JM Coetzee had passed away.
I am surprised Space Karen hasn’t given them all blue ticks given this seems to the sort of thing he encourages on X.
This person being named: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomma...
We are back to the niche of a niche of a niche conversation
A lengthy article from the Telegraph in 2015 Why Great Novels Don’t Get Noticed Now
The author … Gaby Wood
Last year, when literary fiction seemed to fall either into the category of formal experiment (Ali Smith’s How to Be Both; Will Self’s Shark) or into an essentially 19th-century tradition (Neel Mukherjee’s The Lives of Others; Richard Flanagan’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North), one book cut through all that by simply being intimate, direct yet oddly mysterious. Last Tuesday, it was longlisted for the Baileys Prize for Women’s Fiction, a belated flicker of attention for a novel that deserves far more.
Samantha Harvey’s Dear Thief was published last September to excellent reviews, and was, to my mind, one of the most beguiling novels of the year. It was the third book by an author whose 2009 debut had won significant prizes and seemed to promise further fame. It was published by Dan Franklin at Jonathan Cape, arguably Britain’s most respected editor of literary fiction. It had the marketing and publicity machine of Penguin Random House behind it. Its cover – admittedly a sombre and indistinct affair – carried a blurb from Michael Cunningham, author of The Hours, who referred to its “profound beauty”. In The New Yorker, the influential literary critic James Wood singled it out for a sustained hymn of praise, calling it “a beautiful, tentative success, a novel with no interest in conformity”. In short, Dear Thief couldn’t have had more going for it.
But just a few months after its initial hardback publication in the UK last September – and a long way ahead of its paperback publication in autumn 2015 – few people had heard of it, and even fewer could lay their hands on it. In bookshops, it was barely stocked. By last week, it had sold just over 1,000 copies in Britain (compare that with sales of Martin Amis’s books, which generally reach about 25,000).
What happened? The story of Dear Thief is the story of how our best fiction can get lost, and how hard it is for readers to find the books they’ll love.
The novel takes the form of a single letter, written over the course of six months by a 52-year-old woman to her missing childhood friend. At its heart is a theft – the book’s title might almost be seen to stand in place of a first line – which took place 15 years earlier: the theft of the narrator’s husband by her invisible correspondent.
Although this is revealed slowly – it is too painful to address at once – and though the narrator has felt jealousy “whittle [her] down to something dishonourable”, the greater loss turns out to be that of the volatile, unearthly friend, not the husband. Nicholas is still there, occasionally – he comes for dinner and stays over, both their lives dulled by disuse. But Butterfly, as she is known, haunts through her disappearance. When they were girls, she and the narrator used to play a game called “Chair”: in a pitch dark room, one would have to close her eyes and guess whether or not the other had sat down. How could they have lost each other now? The narrator’s relationship with Butterfly is a freighted game of poker, a negotiation with a ghost.
“May I stay a longish while?” Butterfly asks when she turns up on the family’s doorstep, nine years after the women have last seen each other.
“How long is longish?” asks the narrator.
“A decade or two, I’m clean out of money,” comes the reply.
The rest is plain for any reader to see: of course she will live vicariously through them. Of course she will insinuate herself into their marriage. Of course the couple’s baby son will be transfixed by the interloper’s “ragged beauty”.
Because the novel is written in the second person – “In answer to a question you asked a long time ago,” it begins – it gets you in its grip. The reader is instantly implicated in the story: though clearly you are not Butterfly, you are nevertheless somehow thrown into the shape of a character, and into an acquaintance with the narrator that suggests, as if by dim remembrance, that you knew each other once, and well.
Harvey’s language is poetic, in a way that’s brave rather than sentimental, and her intricate observations demand to be dwelled upon. (She has a postgraduate degree in philosophy and speaks about novels as “thought experiments”.)
In terms of temperament, the drama queen is the addressee – an exotic, unknowable woman who is always somehow dying. Yet you infer that the letter-writer is not quite living either: she is stuck in her own drama of defeat. She observes too acutely such things as the fleeting nature of happiness, she flares up from time to time, and she fantasises about violence. “Sometimes I imagine, out of sheer playfulness, that I am writing this as a kind of defence for having murdered and buried you under the patio.”
I meet Harvey in a coffee shop in Soho. She has come up to London from Bath, where she lives and teaches creative writing. As we linger over cake and tea I can’t help being struck by the sense the writer makes of the books: her thought is so vigorous you feel anchored to the spot.
Harvey’s previous two books have had male protagonists: an old man suffering from Alzheimer’s in the case of The Wilderness, and two middle-aged brothers in All is Song. For Dear Thief, she was initially inspired by a Leonard Cohen song, Famous Blue Raincoat, about three people and a betrayal, but more than that she wanted to write about relationships between women, which “often precede and outlive various romantic ones”.
“Common perceptions of female friendships are morning coffees discussing children, bags, periods and agreeing about the misdemeanours of men… mild, soft, nurturing relationships,” she suggests. “In fact, they can be complex, intense (sometimes emotionally violent) rites of passage, give rise to deep jealousy, possessiveness, ardent love, and have the capacity to shape us in ways other relationships don’t. That’s what I wanted to write about – those relationships in their own right, as the love stories themselves, not as side issues in a bigger drama.”
When The Wilderness was published with relative ease, she says, “the serendipity and success of that book tilted my view of what could be expected”. The novel was her MA thesis; it was picked up by an agent and published by Cape. It went on to be longlisted for the Man Booker Prize, shortlisted for both the Orange Prize and the Guardian First Book Award, and it won the Betty Trask Award. In the UK, it has sold 24,000 copies in three separate editions.
All is Song had nothing like the same reception; but then, it was a more difficult book, which Harvey herself conceded was “a gamble”. “I kept feeling the impulse to put something more marketable in it, then decided: 'No, I’m going to stick to my guns’,” she said when it was published.
Around that time, Harvey was considered for a couple of prizes, and had strong supporters, but All is Song didn’t quite seem the book to reward. Dear Thief is, without a doubt, stronger and more raw, the book her fans knew she could write. But just when the world should have behaved as if it had been waiting for that very novel to arrive, Harvey’s career seemed to lose momentum.
Her editor Dan Franklin explains, a little despairingly, that “the really difficult thing about her is that she writes serious books, which is not to the modern taste. People like easy-peasy books that slip down without any trouble. How do you have a career in 2015 writing really thoughtful, philosophical books? In a way, the miracle was that The Wilderness worked – not that the other two didn’t.”
And so, Harvey finds herself at the heart of good fiction’s very modern problem. Not so long ago, everyone thought the main threat to publishing was the ebook. But that hasn’t turned out be true: ebooks have been predominantly aimed at commercial fiction, and have, for the most part, worked well. The much greater difficulty, now that bookshops are in decline and newspapers have increasingly little space, is how to tell readers books exist at all. Amazon doesn’t champion anything; Waterstones buys very little upfront and only gets behind a book once it has already shown signs of life. As Tom Weldon, CEO of Penguin Random House UK, tells me, “The challenge in book publishing is not digital. It is how do you get the next great book noticed?”
“I think she’s writing in the most difficult bit of the market,” Philip Jones, editor of The Bookseller, says of Harvey, “serious fiction, from a serious-minded publisher.”
Still, I wonder if this talk about the marginality of serious or “difficult” fiction is a little out of date. Last year, Eimear McBride’s A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing won the Goldsmiths Prize – an award invented in order to give prestige to the sorts of books that were generally ignored by mainstream prizes – and then went on to win pretty much everything else. The year before that, Will Self’s quixotically narrated novel Umbrella was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. This year, Ali Smith’s How to Be Both, a complicated idea offered in two flippable parts, has won or nearly won every prize there is. When Faber took on the paperback publication of A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing, that formidable heir to James Joyce was advertised on the side of double-decker buses. You could argue, then, that the mainstream has moved.
But Jones says sales figures are stacked against that idea: all major publishers turned down McBride’s book initially, and if you’re just looking at the numbers, he suggests, “that was the right decision”. Franklin says “it’s about discoverability”, before adding that the kind of book Harvey writes is unlikely to do well on social media. (That’s debatable; the book recommendations website Goodreads currently carries a large number of excellent peer-to-peer reviews of Dear Thief.) Really, he explains, only a prize or a shortlisting will “break the deadlock”.
In the US, Dear Thief was published by a promising, high-end, multi-platform publisher called Atavist Books. It was founded by media and movie moguls Barry Diller and Scott Rudin, alongside esteemed British literary publisher Frances Coady. Its early publications included works by Karen Russell, Hari Kunzru and Kamila Shamsie. But just after Dear Thief came out, Atavist Books went under. The novel wasn’t promoted, and was barely distributed. The rights were taken over by a traditional publisher, which has yet to bring out its own edition.
As a result, Harvey has found herself having to consider why she writes at all. “Being published is a bit like being entered into a race you don’t even want to run,” she tells me, “but, once running, can’t help but not want to lose. There’s lots of anxiety about your position in that race. Hence my decision to forget the race and simply write, regardless. Even regardless of whether or not I’m published and have readers – that the desire to write (not to out-write others) is all that matters, to keep integrity, to enjoy it.”
“She doesn’t do the lowest common denominator,” says Franklin. “It’s Virginia Woolf, not Margaret Mitchell. She’s writing proper literature, and it’s really difficult to sell.”
So what do you do? I ask him. After all Franklin, who is about to retire, publishes Julian Barnes, Martin Amis, Ian McEwan… He has some knowledge of bringing out “proper literature”.
“You publish it and you pray,” he says. “I’ve always believed that if someone’s good enough, eventually they’ll get discovered. And I don’t think it’ll be in one’s lifetime, necessarily.”
My advice would be not to wait until the next lifetime to discover this generation’s Virginia Woolf. The time to read Dear Thief is now.
Hello All,I have a ticket to the Waterstones Piccadilly (London) sold out event tomorrow night - Samantha Harvey's first public event. If anyone is interested let me know. No charge. I can email you the ticket.
I won't be able to get there as I have to work late tomorrow.
Hopefully it wont go to waste...
Jo x
I loved Dear Thief and The Western Wind - the reason I'm thrilled to see Harvey take this, even though Orbital was my second choice.
Anna wrote: "Bella (Kiki) wrote: "Orbital is topical since mankind is knowingly, for the most part, destroying the Earth with bad habits that are, hopefully, still reversible. (But probably won't be.) Didn't so..."I think that's a wonderful interpretation, Anna, thank you for posting it. When I reread, I'm going to keep all of your comments in mind. :-)
Paul wrote: "A book I’d recommend to lots of people is pretty low down my criteria for what ought to win finest fiction literary prizes - indeed disqualifying. But that’s why I and the Booker don’t get along. ..."
Thank you for the information, Paul. I would have never known. Doing something like that never occurs to me.
Granta have removed paywall on the Harvey short story for those wanting more of her workhttps://granta.com/flowers-appear-on-...
Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer wrote: "A lengthy article from the Telegraph in 2015 Why Great Novels Don’t Get Noticed Now
The author … Gaby Wood
Last year, when literary fiction seemed to fall either into the category of formal expe..."
Thank you for posting that, GY. I do love Harvey's writing. I loved The Western Wind, and now I'm anxious to read Dear, Thief.
One of my favorite books is The Lie by the late Helen Dunmore. I thought everything about it was perfect.
Getting back to Harvey, she does write beautiful prose.
Anna wrote: "Also, I think in these war- and agenda-torn times of ours, it was the best choice that was understandably preferred to the other shortlisted narratives that - without my having read any of them but partially the Kushner - seem to address the usual personal and historic dramas more specifically. The jury's choice for any frontal approach to sensitive subjects could have deepened the conflicts between the various ideological sides these days.."Seriously? I understand a panel being sensitive to issues around racism, representation etc But those kinds of considerations would normally be dealt with earlier in the process of narrowing down to a shortlist.
But this is a British prize we're not currently at war, the centre left is - at least currently - in the ascendent, we're not embroiled in the culture wars raging in the US - although not entirely immune to them either - so struggle to see what ideological issues the other authors/titles connect to that would/should make a UK-based panel wary? Can you elaborate?
My reading only (and you can disagree) - but I see one novel as directly relevant to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, one which (again my view) even divides the left here
Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer wrote: "My reading only (and you can disagree) - but I see one novel as directly relevant to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, one which (again my view) even divides the left here"Again might be better to spell it out, as really can't be sure what you're referring to here. I know Yael van der Wouden was born in Israel but she left when she was 10, and in any case not sure an individual counts as a 'cultural institution' in the context of the current boycott. So presumably not referencing that?
I wasn't assuming Anna was solely referring to broader issues like Gaza when she mentioned 'agendas'. I'm aware that we have a rather different perspective on what kinds of 'sexual' content we may/may not find problematic, or at least past reviews suggest that: certainly I've never felt moved to refer to the inclusion of a scene of two women kissing as 'PC filth." Obviously we're all entitled to our opinions about what is/isn't acceptable but all this heavily coded stuff is pointless in terms of furthering/opening up discussion and often misleading.
To the group in general, referencing the term "culture wars":I live in the US now, though I was born and grew up in Italy and was educated in the UK, at the University of Leeds, where I obtained an MA in English and creative writing. The "culture wars" that are supposed to be "raging" here are ignored by most people. It's just politics as usual. From what I've read and what people tell me, this is just more of the same. The pendulum swings left, then back right again, then left again. Most Americans are pretty apathetic to what politicians do. As long as they can get by, they really don't care. If a political issue doesn't affect them directly, they don't care. I'm not saying it's good to be that apathetic, but that's what I've seen and experienced since I've been here. The conservatives are in power, but the people will probably tire of that and vote the liberals into power in the midterm elections. Four years from now, a liberal candidate will almost surely win the presidency. The pendulum has already begun its swing. It's just all smoke and very little fire. Some, but nothing like a culture war.
(view spoiler)
Alwynne wrote: "so struggle to see what ideological issues the other authors/titles connect to that would/should make a UK-based panel wary? Can you elaborate?"Alwynne, the Booker Prize is followed closely by English-speaking readers everywhere around the world, not just Britain. As one of those, I've never considered this to be a literary prize that is relevant to the UK only. I may be wrong, of course, but I believe good literature explores the universal (not just the atomized individual), and shouldn't be just a sounding board for current social issues that are heavily amplified by political interests.
I simply meant that with elections in many countries around Europe and two wars of major relevance going on (e.g. the Russian aggression in Ukraine is followed with extraordinary concern in Eastern Europe), a meditative book such as Orbital is more comforting than a more traditional narrative with clearly defined protagonists and life stories with psychological insight and so on. Of course, people don't just read the winners, but the jury's choice does act as a symbolic reaffirmation or a shaping force of public mood. Well, at least in the very narrow category of the reading public :)
Bella (Kiki) wrote: "I live in the US now, and the culture wars that are supposed to be raging here are ignored by most people?"
Same here, Bella :) Perhaps it's because most people don't read or engage in any way with culture.
I do not think this is the right place to spoil the book so may add the links to the book chat.
Bella (Kiki) wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "Anna wrote: "Also, I think in these war- and agenda-torn times of ours, it was the best choice that was understandably preferred to the other shortlisted narratives that - without m..."I'm not sure who you're responding to but the fact that my post heads up yours suggests you're responding to me. I thought I had made it clear some time ago that I have no interest in your thoughts, opinions, observations and/or any wish to engage with you. Obviously I was not clear enough.
Anna wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "so struggle to see what ideological issues the other authors/titles connect to that would/should make a UK-based panel wary? Can you elaborate?"Alwynne, the Booker Prize is follow..."
Thanks for the clarification, Although if that's what the panel are doing/have done, I think it's appalling.
Anna wrote: "Alwynne wrote: "so struggle to see what ideological issues the other authors/titles connect to that would/should make a UK-based panel wary? Can you elaborate?"Thank you, Anna. Again, I agree with you.
Anna, I was discussing the Booker Prize with some people on another international board. There were people from all over Europe, both East and West discussing, people from Australia, people from Africa, people from the Eastern and Far Eastern countries, in short people from everywhere discussing the Booker shortlist and their favorites. And, those same people were also discussing the US presidential elections. Some were commiserating with US residents, especially the vulnerable US residents, and others were afraid themselves. They would say things like, "If it can happen there, it can happen here," "I already see signs of it happening here," "We are afraid of what his victory means for us," etc. Even, "We're praying for you."
I think the world has figuratively grown much smaller. We all seem to know the larger picture of what is happening the world over, and what happens in countries other than our own can deeply affect our own.
Still, in light of the above, those people were only engaging in the most superficial of ways. I think many people do not engage with what some term "culture wars" unless the outcome affects them. For example, those with no women of childbearing age in their circle of loved ones simply do not care if women have access to abortion on demand or not. Those who have no loved ones who might be deported do not care if our incoming president deports immigrants on the scale he says he'd like to or not. Most people are simply carrying on with life as usual. They are not celebrating anything nor are they seeking to change anything. They are simply "going with the flow."
I can only speak for the area in which I live. Here, people watch the news, they care about what happens in the country and what happens in other countries, but they aren't doing anything about it. They aren't engaging in any way, pro or con. They aren't donating to help the oppressed in Gaza,, for example, nor are they speaking out on a message board. They are simply living their lives as they always have.
Again, I think your comment was spot on and worded very eloquently.
Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer wrote: "My reading only (and you can disagree) - but I see one novel as directly relevant to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, one which (again my view) even divides the left here"As it does in the US, GY.
I am coming very late to this discussion as I have been tied up with work for the last week. I am pleased by Orbital‘s win. Although I found the book boring and slow at times, I also thought certain sections were beautiful and brilliant (Orbit 13, mentioned above, comes to mind). Out of this shortlist, James is the only book I would have preferred to win over this one. Orbital is a book I can imagine rereading from time to time. As I believe I mentioned in the book-specific discussion, Orbital is best read in small sections (to avoid it becoming monotonous). This is the kind of book I might leave on my nightstand and read for a few minutes each evening before sleep. Or this would be a great “toothbrushing“ book. I keep a book in my bathroom and read while my electric toothbrush goes through its 2.5 minute cycle. Usually, it’s poetry, but I think this would work well for Orbital too. Reading a short segment from this book would be a great way to start or end any day, in my opinion.
I was just saying the same to someone in the signing queue tonight.
Just taking to Head of Books at Waterstones who (*) thinks this might /will be the best selling winner ever. But was also very keen on Held and would have been very happy if it won.
(*) I think that’s what she said I was two glasses of champagne in.
I have just held The Iris!
I had the pleasure last night of attending an interview between Gaby Wood and Samantha Harvey tonight. This was followed by a book signing in the fabulous pop up Booker library. GW started the evening mentioning the interview she did with SH for the Telegraph in 2009 which turned into an article about Why Great Novels Don’t Get Noticed - see my post 215 above. The judges were not aware of the article.
A few snippets:
GW bumped into SH in the loo at the start of the ceremony and successfully kept a poker face.
SH was convinced she had not won. She did however look down at the tablecloth at the time of the award announcement as she had heard the camera approached the winning table rumour - when she heard her name and for some time afterwards she was convinced it was a dream.
She has had to reluctantly concede that her partner - who claims to have inspired the book - might have said, some years back when she was exploring the idea of writing a novel set in a confined space - “what about the ISS”
She writes her novel in three drafts. The first is to basically create the world of the novel. The second is to edit down scenes, delete characters etc. The third is sentence by sentence crafting. She hates the first part, world building is not her thing - she has only had five novel ideas ever and each one ended as a book. She loves the third - going through sentence by sentence.
The reason the ISS is not mentioned or specific modules of it (they were in the original draft) was based on a conversation with Max Porter on a walk in the woods - who suggested she drop them. She found it liberating - she was in the world of fiction then ( which she knows how to navigate). not the world of the ISS (which she does not).
One passage discussed was when one of the cosmonauts makes contact with a woman who as they lose signal tells him her husband died. For SH this was a marathon for one of her themes - loneliness , a desire for connection and almost but quite managing it - the way people miss each other in their different orbits.
The US editors did ask if it were possible for the astronauts/cosmonauts not to sleep for the last five orbits.
SH can’t actually read the UK version of her book as the writing is too small so has to read from the US version.
One of SHs main aims in the novel was to create kinetic energy without conflict (not least as conflict on the ISS is nit realistic) - so she aimed to do this by using sentences to push/pull/move the reader, and variable time signatures to keep the narrative propulsive without being dramatic.
She wanted to somehow change and mythologise countries and give new appreciation of countries by how they are viewed from above rather than how we think of them now (she used Cuba as an example).
Due to her insomnia (subject of her last book - a non fiction one), the onset of middle age and world events the last few years she felt she needs some form of escapism. By zooming out (rather than zooming in on the problems/issues) she felt could get a sense of peace from seeing the complexity and contradictions of the world all at once.
All very interesting, GY. Thank you!
Gwendolyn wrote: "I am coming very late to this discussion as I have been tied up with work for the last week. I am pleased by Orbital‘s win. Although I found the book boring and slow at times, I also thought certai..."Should a novel that wins a prestigious prize be one that should be read in small segments or only for a few minutes at a time? To me, that means the novel is a failure or isn't really a novel at all. (I'm not criticizing the way you read it in any way at all! We all read in the way that's best for us.) For me, a good novel, especially one judged best of the year, should be one we are loathe to part from to sleep, go to work, go out to eat, etc. It means one has created the suspense - in some manner - necessary to maintain the novel's throughline, one that contains characters the reader can connect with.
I think Harvey writes beautiful prose at times, and the book flows nicely, but I really didn't care what happened to any of the astronauts or cosmonauts. I found probably 95% of the book mind-numbingly boring. I think there should be some suspense, something to make the reader want to turn the page other than simply to finish the book.
For me, the book started off beautifully, but it soon became more boring than any book I can ever remember reading, and I think the average reader is going to feel that way. Early on, another poster, and I'm sorry, but I forgot which one, made the comment that Held was deep, Orbital only pretends to be deep. I agree with that assessment. And no one should have to read a book more than once unless he or she wants to.
Beautiful prose does not make a beautiful novel. I think it takes more. Maybe the fault lies with me. I'm not sure. I will say, James held my attention on every page. Held did as well. Harvey strings beautiful words together in a beautiful way, and that's about all I can say for Orbital.
Again, just my opinion. If yours differs radically, please know that I respect it and will try to understand it. I know I don't have all the answers, and I hope I don't come off as pretending to.
It's an interesting question. I am strictly serially monogamous with books, so ones that work best when sampled over time don't work for me. But I'd think of that as more a failure of my reading style than necessarily the book.There are certainly books - some of the greatest I've read - that are so powerful one simply has to put them down for a while simply to recover - one simply feels too wrung out to continue (Krasznahorkai's War & War as an example).
(Can't comment on Orbital due to my boycott!)
Thank you, Paul. You are very kind. I share your monogamy about books, so that could have prompted my reaction to the suggestion to read it a little at a time.War on War, yes, definitely. I am a great fan of that book. It makes me sob each time I read it. And even with his very weighty themes, it had a throughline: Korin's desire to preserve the stolen manuscript for posterity. And we are glued to the pages wondering if he will commit suicide or not.
I found, every time I've read Orbital, I become very bored, very quickly. The beginning five or six pages are filled with lush, simply gorgeous prose, as the astronauts look at earth. However, the prose very quickly becomes quite pedestrian, boring even. I will say this, Harvey's prose, no matter how one perceives it, flows wonderfully throughout the novel. Her transitions are perfect, even if one doesn't agree with them.
I think a novelist's job is to make readers care, usually about characters. I realize Orbital is not primarily centered around any of the six characters. Okay. Fine. I do not mind that. It is thematic. It's about the human experience in space, the nature of time, and how humans feel living prolonged periods of, to them, very strange time off the earth. It does succeed at exploring its themes. I will give Harvey that. But she didn't make me care. I barely cared when the Japanese astronaut's mother died, and I'm a very compassionate person. The astronaut, herself didn't seem to be too affected.
I have read other thematic books where the character(s) are explored only superficially. To take one almost everyone over the age of 13 is familiar with, Lord of the Flies examines some very weighty themes about civilisation, rules and order, lost innocence, mob mentality, etc., and though I didn't like the book, I was, as a young teen riveted to the page to see how it all turns out.
The late Helen Dunmore wrote a gorgeous thematic book called The Lie, which explores, primarily, the psychological and emotional toll of war, survivor's guilt, and the consequences of a lie, as well as other weighty themes. Again, I was riveted to the pages. We don't learn much about the book's main character, Daniel Branwell, but the book has a throughline: Daniel's struggle to reconnect with Cornish society after the horrors of WWI. I was so deeply affected and moved by this book that I couldn't put it down even to sleep at my usual bedtime. I lost half a night's sleep to The Lie, and I didn't care. It was perfect.
I suppose the throughline of Orbital could be said to be the characters' reactions to time, to being of the Earth, yet not living on it. I'm fine with that. What I'm not fine with is the fact that Harvey failed to make me care. I cared deeply about Daniel Branwell. I cared deeply about Korin.
To me, Orbital is devoid of conflict. So the astronauts and cosmonauts don't want to use each other's toilets. I do not care. I think Harvey could have given us something. The menace of the developing typhoon, for example. I wanted so much to care, and I couldn't. Each time I read the book, I read it in one go, and each time, I was so bored, I almost fell asleep. Without conflict, I don't think one has a story, plot driven, of course, or even thematic. I suppose the conflict could have been subtle, like Nell's feelings about her body in weightlessness, the fact that she perceived her hand as being so big when working outside the station.
Each time I've read Orbital, I've wanted to speed read, not to see how it all turns out, but just to have finished the darn thing. I didn't expect deep character development, but I did expect something to make me care, just as I cared so deeply about The Lie. That book is seared into the fabric of my life. The only positive thing I could say about the Orbital is that I'm awed by Harvey's ability to string words together so beautifully. I felt Held did a much better job of making me care, but I wasn't a judge. LOL
Perhaps it just isn't the book for me, and if that's the case, that's fine. I do realize Harvey cannot please everyone, all the time.
Thank you again, Paul. I have to wonder when the boycott will end? Ever?
I agree, Kiki. Orbital was boring for me too and lacking in conflict. I did enjoy certain passages that explored some philosophical concepts.
Bella (Kiki) wrote: "I think a novelist's job is to make readers care, usually about characters."That's not actually a 'rule' of literature, though, that's your personal criteria for a good book. Which is fine.
But plenty of novelists, especially if espousing a postmodern scepticism about the very nature of 'character' or the ideology of 'plot' will see their 'job' quite differently.
It's nice to be able to embrace a spectrum of novels based on differing understandings of what constitutes 'a novel' from different theoretical perspectives and subjective positions.
Harvey does not do either plot or character …. Except in Western Wind which was a deliberate attempt for her to experiment with doing both. Feels admirable to me - although at the same time I did find Orbital dragged a little each time I read it
But the more I hear her speak the more I appreciate what she is doing.
Gwendolyn wrote: "I agree, Kiki. Orbital was boring for me too and lacking in conflict. I did enjoy certain passages that explored some philosophical concepts."Thank you, Gwendolyn. I greatly appreciate it, and I agree with you. Maybe it just isn't the book for you or me, and that's fine, I think.
Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer wrote: "Harvey does not do either plot or character …. Except in Western Wind which was a deliberate attempt for her to experiment with doing both. Feels admirable to me - although at the same time I did ..."
I do appreciate and respect the book, even if I don't completely agree with its success. I enjoyed The Western Wind more, though. I respect all authors who try to give us their best, and I certainly feel Harvey did that. She seems humble, and she seems to care about her writing. There is no way I could not respect that greatly.
I don't need a plot. I just wanted her to make me care like I cared about Daniel Branwell or Korin.
Roman Clodia wrote: "Bella (Kiki) wrote: "I think a novelist's job is to make readers care, usually about characters."That's not actually a 'rule' of literature, though, that's your personal criteria for a good book...."
Thank you. You're right. That's true. I have thought that my longing to care about Orbital might be a positive indicator of the book. If we dislike something, we aren't dismayed about not caring. We simply dislike it and move on.
My personal criteria for a book are not set in stone at all. I don't impose any rules on any piece of literature, but I do like to care about something.
The shortlist books have already gone in to win the US National Book Award and Canadian Giller Prize
And a double winner of the Stella Prize and Miles Franklin in Australia. I wish.
Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer wrote: "The shortlist books have already gone in to win the US National Book Award and Canadian Giller Prize"Reinforcing that it was a strong year for the Booker!
Gumble's Yard - Golden Reviewer wrote: "The shortlist books have already gone in to win the US National Book Award and Canadian Giller Prize"I've been sick and busy, so haven't kept up, but has Held won any prizes? I suppose I could stop being lazy and look it up! LOL
Oh! The Giller Prize. That's wonderful! I love Held!
The Mookse and the Gripes
Books mentioned in this topic
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Erasure (other topics)
Orbital (other topics)
Creation Lake (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Percival Everett (other topics)Yael van der Wouden (other topics)
Samantha Harvey (other topics)
Rachel Kushner (other topics)
Charlotte Wood (other topics)
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But the compère of the evening, who definitely would have known the result, follows the account. It may be that she created it?