Orbital

By: Samantha Harvey

Narrated by: Sarah Naudi

WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE 2024

Winner of the 2024 Hawthornden Prize

Shortlisted for the 2024 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction

Shortlisted for the 2024 Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction

A singular new novel from Betty Trask Prize winner Samantha Harvey, Orbital is an eloquent meditation on space and life on our planet through the eyes of six astronauts circling the earth in 24 hours

"Ravishingly beautiful."—Joshua Ferris, New York Times

A slender novel of epic power and the winner of the Booker Prize 2024, Orbital deftly snapshots one day in the lives of six women and men traveling through space. Selected for one of the last space station missions of its kind before the program is dismantled, these astronauts and cosmonauts—from America, Russia, Italy, Britain, and Japan—have left their lives behind to travel at a speed of over seventeen thousand miles an hour as the earth reels below. We glimpse moments of their earthly lives through brief communications with family, their photos, and talismans; we watch them whip up dehydrated meals, float in gravity-free sleep, and exercise in regimented routines to prevent atrophying muscles; we witness them form bonds that will stand between them and utter solitude. Most of all, we are with them as they behold and record their silent blue planet. Their experiences of sixteen sunrises and sunsets and the bright, blinking constellations of the galaxy are at once breathtakingly awesome and surprisingly intimate.

Profound and contemplative, Orbital is a moving elegy to our environment and planet.

©2023 Samantha Harvey (P)2023 Penguin Audio

Many passages to really think about, terrible audiobook

I'm not sure how the narrator chose this profession.. she has an off-again, mostly on-again lisp, but what makes for more difficult listening is that she completely aspirated or doesn't even pronounce the final "s" sounds of most words. at least for plural words you can usually tell it by context, but for other parts I had no clue what word(s) she had just said. I felt like this would've made for an enjoyable listening otherwise..

a meditation more than a novel

The writing is quite lyrical and evocative, but there's essentially no plot and only sketches of characters. Really disliked the wispy-voiced narration style. Recording seems to have some technical issues where the sound fades in and out as if the reader was shifting in her seat.

Wonderful

Beautiful language, spectacular imagery, deeply human. Lovely voice too. Was disappointed when it ended, looking forward to more from the author.

One Day

An immersive journey above our orb. Visions, dreams, fears, big picture, spacial expanse, sine waves of travel from a dimension few experience. I’m glad someone suggested I buy a ticket. I too will encourage others. Thank you Samantha for knitting the words to paint a video immersion!

More of a meditation that a story

This was not for me. The was some beautiful writing, but it felt repetitive and unengaging. But it is a Booker Prize winner, so there are better critics than me to recommend it.

The Booker winner? Really?

Like others here, I am dumbfounded that this won the Booker. (Percival Everett must be seething.) While the endless descriptions are at times lyrical, inventive, and thought-provoking, the key word here is ‘endless.’ Turns out that mere description does not a novel make. In the last several orbits (that is, chapters) the writing seemed to run down just like the spaceship the characters were riding, devolving into tediously repetitive list-making. The characters were paper dolls; although the author spent a great deal of time describing their thoughts, I never felt that there was a person inside any of those six creations who was actually thinking or feeling those thoughts. It’s a rare feat for a short novel to feel endless, but the number of times I checked to see how much time I had left may have set a new Audible record.

Perspective of inner and outer space

Fascinating exploration of what astronauts must experience as they hurtle around the earth. Shifting perspectives on many levels that broadened me out of my usual limits.

The poetry

I loved the thought provoking imagery and the beautiful way in which the story was told.

Beautiful

This book is a beautiful piece of art that encompasses all of humanity. I highly recommend reading and contemplating the unity of the planet.

Poetic, lyrical, sublime.

I loved this book; wistful and quietly passionate in equal measure, this lyrical interpretation of the ends and beginnings of a planetary epoch leave me aching. A love poem to our Mother Earth, and the courage and foibles of the human race.