2025 Booker Longlist: Universality by Natasha Brown

Next up for our panel is Natasha Brown’s Universality. Four of our panelists read the book, our fifth panelist attempted and abandoned it.

Natasha Brown is a British writer who was named one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists — a once-in-a-decade spotlight on the most promising writers under 40. She studied math at Cambridge, worked in finance for years, and then shook up the literary world with her debut novel Assembly in 2021 — a slim but powerful book that won major awards and put her on all the “writers to watch” lists. Universality is her second novel.

Book Synopsis from Booker website: Remember – words are your weapons, they’re your tools, your currency.’ 

Late one night on a Yorkshire farm, a man is brutally bludgeoned with a solid gold bar. 

A plucky young journalist sets out to uncover the truth surrounding the attack, connecting the dots between an amoral banker landlord, an iconoclastic columnist, and a radical anarchist movement. She solves the mystery, but her viral longread exposé raises more questions than it answers. 

Through a voyeuristic lens, Universality focuses on words: what we say, how we say it, and what we really mean. The follow-up novel to Natasha Brown’s Assembly is a compellingly nasty celebration of the spectacular force of language. It dares you to look away.  

Anita’s Thoughts: I’m not normally a fan of satire, but honestly my rating doesn’t quite capture how great I think this book is. The criteria isn’t quite right. The media today deserves this book and the complete skewering it delivers. I think a book like this will be more powerful when examined through the rear view mirror of history, but that remains to be seen. My reservation is that it’s great satire, but is it really great literature? My fiction loving heart says they aren’t. I wouldn’t shortlist it.

Writing quality: 5/5
Originality: 5/5
Character development: 2/4
Plot development: 2/4
Overall enjoyment: 2/2
Total: 16/20

Nicole’s Thoughts: 

It “dares you to look away” – I looked away. I’m not sure who wins here? I could not finish this short book. Ideologically I align with Brown, but “woke” has gone too far even for me and reading this was like being in a dentist chair with an exposed nerve. Just couldn’t do it.

Tracy’s Thoughts: I was so excited when this came out- I read it almost immediately. And I remember almost nothing. I remember a big house, a gold bar, and a snappy use of language. I hope her next one is amazing, because this one isn’t, and Brown is an excellent writer.

Writing quality: 5/5
Originality: 3/5
Character development: 2/4
Plot development: 2/4
Overall enjoyment: 1/2
Total: 13/20

Lisa’s Thoughts: In this book, each section is told from a different point of view. It’s like layers of an onion being peeled away, each revealing another layer. This is a writing choice I typically enjoy, and I did here, too. The depressing part is that the layers peel away until you end up with nothing left. There is no core. It’s a commentary on words and narrative being detached from meaning. In the end, this book is very clever, but not a book where you feel any sort of emotional connection to the humans depicted in it.

Writing quality: 5/5
Originality: 4/5
Character development: 2/4
Plot development: 4/4
Overall enjoyment: 1/2
Total: 16 /20

Jen’s Thoughts: I don’t have too much more to add over what my fellow panelists have written. I mostly enjoyed part of this, laughed at various sections, and paused at other times to reflect on the commentary. But it didn’t leave a lasting impression with me and I fear it will be a book that fades into the past for me. Brown is a skilled writer and I look forward to reading more of her work. I did enjoy the weaving of different types of narratives/perspectives and her humor but it wasn’t a standout in the longlist.

Writing quality: 5/5
Originality: 4/5
Character development: 2/4
Plot development: 1/4
Overall enjoyment: 1/2
Total: 13/20

Rankings
1. Audition: 17.88
2. Universality: 14.5
3. The South: 14.25
4. Flashlight: 14.2
5. One Boat: 13
6. Love forms: 10.5

Have you read it?  What do you think? Want to try it for yourself? You can purchase your copy here: Universality