At only 136 pages, Samantha Harvey’s novel Orbital is the second-shortest book to win the prestigious Booker Prize — and it’s first to be set in space.
Orbital follows a day in the life of six astronauts onboard the International Space Station — two men and four women who reflect on humanity and the planet over the course of 16 sunrises and sunsets. They are there to test the limits of the human body, to collect meteorological data and conduct scientific experiments. But mostly, they observe. From inside the space station or out during space walks, they take in the beauty of Earth from a distance:
“Europe runs into Asia with not a note of fanfare,” Harvey writes. “Continents and countries come one after the other, and the earth feels not small, but almost endlessly connected. An epic poem of flowing verses.”
The novel is nearly plotless, but Harvey’s writing shimmers as she describes the astronauts’ daily life and their view of the world. Circling the earth 16 times, we spin past continents and see the vast sweep of glaciers, deserts, mountains and oceans. One astronaut learns that her mother has died. Another reflects on a painting he never quite understood. They all watch an enormous typhoon gather over an island and threaten people they love.
During her acceptance speech for the Booker Prize, Harvey quoted astronomer Carl Sagan, who famously said, “We are made of star stuff.” We are made of Earth stuff too, she said, “And what we do to the earth, we do to ourselves.”
