UK writer Samantha Harvey wins 2024 Booker with space novel

LONDON — British writer Samantha Harvey won the prestigious Booker Prize on Tuesday for her science fiction novel following six astronauts as they orbit Earth over 24 hours.

Set aboard the International Space Station, Harvey’s “Orbital” tracks two men and four women from Japan, Russia, the United States, Britain and Italy as they observe and reflect on their home planet, touching on themes of mourning, desire and the climate crisis.

The Booker, which comes with a 50,000 pound ($64,000) cash prize, has launched careers and courted controversy since its creation in 1969.

Past laureates include Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan, Julian Barnes and Kazuo Ishiguro.

“I was not expecting that,” Harvey said upon learning of her win, the first by a woman since Atwood was recognised for “The Testaments” alongside Bernardine Evaristo’s “Girl, Woman, Other”, adding she was “overwhelmed”.

In her acceptance speech, Harvey dedicated the prize to “everybody who does speak for and not against the Earth; for and not against the dignity of other humans, other life; and all the humans who speak for and call for and work for peace”.

‘Everyone and no one’ 

Just 136 pages long, “Orbital” is the second-shortest novel to win the award and the first to be set in space, according to the Booker Prize Foundation.

It is the 49-year-old Harvey’s fifth novel, winning 15 years after her debut novel “The Wilderness” was longlisted for the Booker.

Chair of the judges, Edmund de Waal, said that “everyone and no one is the subject” of Harvey’s novel, “as six astronauts in the International Space Station circle the earth observing the passages of weather across the fragility of borders and time zones”.

“With her language of lyricism and acuity Harvey makes our world strange and new for us,” he added.

A record five women were in the running for the prize, which was announced at a ceremony in London.

The others were Rachel Kushner for “Creation Lake”, Anne Michaels for “Held”, Yael van der Wouden for “The Safekeep” and Charlotte Wood for “Stone Yard Devotional”.

Percival Everett’s “James” rounded out the shortlist.

The prize is seen as a talent spotter of names not necessarily widely known to the general public.

The Booker is open to works of fiction by writers of any nationality, written in English and published in the UK or Ireland between October 1, 2023 and September 30, 2024.