Nov 11
It’s time for our panel to pick our winner. Find out which book our panelists think will win the prize this year. The prize will be announced tomorrow (and thus the reason for why I pushed out the last three posts in the same day.
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Apologies for rushing through these last three posts but time got away from me and I wanted to post this last one before our predictions post (which I will also post tonigh). Our panel had somewhat mixed reviews for Held. You can read our short reviews here: Held. The novel made it onto 3 of our predictions lists with Nicole, Tracy, and Anita predicting it. The Booker judges had this to say about the book…
‘The first few pages of this brief kaleidoscopic novel from the author of Fugitive Pieces may seem forbidding, yet every member of the judging panel was transported by this book. Michaels, a poet, is utterly uncompromising in her vision and execution. She is writing about war, trauma, science, faith and above all love and human connection; her canvas is a century of busy history, but she connects the fragments of her story through theme and image rather than character and chronology, intense moments surrounded by great gaps of space and time. Appropriately for a novel about consciousness, it seems to alter and expand your state of mind. Reading it is a unique experience.’
What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out
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The verdict was also unanimous on this book: Our whole panel loved it. You can read our short reviews here: Stone Yard Devotional. The Booker judges had this to say about the book…
‘Sometimes a visitor becomes a resident, and a temporary retreat becomes permanent. This happens to the narrator in Stone Yard Devotional – a woman with seemingly solid connections to the world who changes her life and settles into a monastery in rural Australia. Yet no shelter is impermeable. The past, in the form of the returning bones of an old acquaintance, comes knocking at her door; the present, in the forms of a global pandemic and a local plague of mice and rats, demands her attention. The novel thrilled and chilled the judges – it’s a book we can’t wait to put into the hands of readers.’
You can read more about the novel and an author interview on the booker prize website: here.
What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out
Read moreNov 8
Our panel was very mixed on this book and so is the literary community. You can read our short reviews here: Creation Lake. The novel made it onto 2 of our predictions lists (Jen and Lisa correctly predicted it). The Booker judges had this to say about the book…
‘Sadie Smith – not her real name – is an FBI agent turned spy-for-hire, whose latest mission is to infiltrate a commune of eco-activists in rural France. She’s an extraordinary creation: sharp-minded, iron-willed, accustomed to moving fast and breaking things. As she investigates the group, she hacks into emails from their guru, a shadowy eccentric who has withdrawn from modernity into the ancient caves that dot the landscape; he has some beguiling ideas about the role of Neanderthals through history. What’s so electrifying about this novel is the way it knits contemporary politics and power with a deep counter-history of human civilisation. We found the prose thrilling, the ideas exciting, the book as a whole a profound and irresistible page-turner.’
You can read more about the novel and an author interview on the booker prize website: here.
What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out
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Next up for our shortlist musings is Orbital by Samantha Harvey. The majority of our panel was underwhelmed by this book. You can read our short reviews here: Orbital. The novel only made it onto 2 of our predictions lists (Jen and Anita correctly predicted it). The Booker judges had this to say about the book…
‘Samantha Harvey’s compact yet beautifully expansive novel invites us to observe Earth’s splendour from the drifting perspective of six astronauts aboard the International Space Station as they navigate bereavement, loneliness and mission fatigue. Moving from the claustrophobia of their cabins to the infinitude of space, from their wide-ranging memories to their careful attention to their tasks, from searching metaphysical inquiry to the spectacle of the natural world, Orbital offers us a love letter to our planet as well as a deeply moving acknowledgement of the individual and collective value of every human life.’
You can read more about the novel and an author interview on the booker prize website: here.
What does our panel think of the odds of this book being this year’s winner? Keep reading to find out
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Our second to last book is Enlightenment by Sarah Perry. Only two of our judges managed to finish this one. One abandoned it and another judge is about halfway through so the rating for this may change slightly when she finishes it.
Cover blurb: Thomas Hart and Grace Macaulay have lived all their lives in the small Essex town of Aldleigh. Though separated in age by three decades, the pair are kindred spirits—torn between their commitment to religion and their desire to explore the world beyond their small Baptist community.
It is two romantic relationships that will rend their friendship, and in the wake of this rupture, Thomas develops an obsession with a vanished nineteenth-century astronomer said to haunt a nearby manor, and Grace flees Aldleigh entirely for London. Over the course of twenty years, by coincidence and design, Thomas and Grace will find their lives brought back into orbit as the mystery of the vanished astronomer unfolds into a devastating tale of love and scientific pursuit. Thomas and Grace will ask themselves what it means to love and be loved, what is fixed and what is mutable, how much of our fate is predestined and written in the stars, and whether they can find their way back to each other.
A thrillingly ambitious novel of friendship, faith, and unrequited love, rich in symmetry and symbolism, Enlightenment is a shimmering wonder of a book and Sarah Perry’s finest work to date.
You can purchase a copy of the book here.
Keep reading to find out how our panellists rated this book.
Read moreJul 11
If you’re anything like me, you’ve been immersed in the recent New York times feature on the top 100 books of the 21st century. A big thank you to my work colleague and friend, John, who turned me on to it since I had been living under a rock and had missed out on the start of it.
Read moreMar 7
Life has forced me into a reading slump for the last several years and outside of the Booker challenge, I’ve found it increasingly more challenging to find the time or mental energy to read (which is why you’ve mostly seen Book worm post on the blog). Luckily for me, my partner is supporting my effort to read more. For the last several years we have been alternating book picks, reading together, and discussing books. The one upside of long distance relationships is that you need to be creative in finding ways to connect and share things that are important to each of you. For me, that’s reading.
This year we have decided to pick books based on monthly themes (that are pretty broad) to push us to read more widely and diversely. To be clear, we are very different readers. He prefers non-fiction and preferably history and I read mostly literary fiction. In February, it was his turn to pick for black history month and to my surprise he picked a fantasy novel. As a non-fiction reader, fantasy is pretty much on the other extreme of the spectrum from his usual genres. His choice was Marlon James’ Black Leopard, Red Wolf. So how did this pick pan out?
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The 2024 Women’s Prize longlist was announced today and this year the list includes many debut novels. You can read more about the longlist on the Women’s Prize website. The full lists includes the following 16 books (click on the book link to purchase a copy from Amazon):
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Relight My Fire by C.K. McDonnell
UK Publication: January 2024
Reviewed by: Book Worm
Rating: [★★★]
This ARC was provided by Random House UK (via NetGalley) in exchange for an honest review.
Magic, mayhem and murder = delicious fun.
jenp27
Nicole Del Sesto
The Reader's Room 