2023 Booker Prize Nominations (Part 5)

 

I suppose most everyone has heard by now that Paul Lynch's Prophet Song was announced last Sunday as winner of the 2023 Booker Prize. If you've read it, congratulations. In the US, we are still waiting on Prophet Song's appearance because Atlantic Monthly Press completely flubbed the job by initially scheduling the book for publication on December 12 - more than two weeks after the Booker ceremony in London. Now, in a case of "too little, too late" Atlantic Monthly Press has moved publication to December 5. 

Since last week's Booker post, I've finished up and reviewed Pearl by Siân Hughes, and I've read all but the last forty pages of Paul Harding's This Other Eden, bringing my 2023 Booker Prize exposure up to eight of the thirteen nominees.

My ranking of those eight books, along with links to the ones reviewed, looks like this:

• The Bee Sting -  Paul Murray
• If I Survive You - Jonathan Escoffery
• Western Lane - Chetna Maroo 
• Pearl - Siân Hughes
• Old God's Time - Sebastian Barry
• This Other Eden - Paul Harding
• A Spell of Good Things - Ayòbámi Adébáyò
• The Ascension - Martin Macinnes 

This Other Eden has an interesting premise, but I get the feeling that Paul Harding is trying a little too hard to make it all politically relevant and correct for today's readers. The novel is set in 1912 on a tiny island off the coast of Maine that is populated by a hodgepodge of racial mixes that produce offspring considered to be Black (even though some easily pass for White and escape life on the island) by people on the mainland. It comes as no surprise when racist White do-gooders spring into action and ruin everything that's remotely good about life on Apple Island. 

After This Other Eden, I'll be down to five more 2023 Booker Books, including Tan Twan Eng's The House of Doors which I have on hand and plan to tackle next. Three of the other four ( are shown in my library system as "on order," so it could be a few weeks before I get to bring any of them home. In fact, I'm twentieth in line for one of only two copies of Prophet Song that have been ordered, third in line for one of the four copes of How to Build a Boat ordered, and first in line for one of the two copies of All the Little Bird-Hearts on order. Library processing can take forever, so I'm not expecting those three any time soon. But there are supposedly five copies of Study for Obedience already on the shelves somewhere in the library system, and I'm number six on that list - and likely to get that one relatively soon. 

I've got to remember to start this challenge earlier next year - and hope to get a little more help from my library and U.S. publishers.