We live in a world, or so it seems, where people are so, so into awards and awards shows like the Grammys, the Emmmys, etc. But I have never seen a book award show. Why? I doubt I am missing them. I do not think they exist. I think that if they do exist they do not get the funding that Red Carpet events get. And I think that is such a shame. Books are just as important if not more than television and music. I am going to keep a keen eye on this and see when awards are coming out and where, if at all, the awards shows are televised. It is the end of the year so I think I will have a bit of an advantage by being able to look over the book awards of this past year.
In the meantime, take a look at this award, this book and this author. It is very interesting.
Man Booker Prize for Fiction
The Man Booker International Prize is awarded every two years to a living author who has published a work of fiction in the English language. The inaugural prize was given in 2005 to Albanian writer Ismail Kadare. The Man Booker Prize,the parent of the International Prize, is given to the best work of fiction by a writer who is a citizen of the British Commonwealth or the Republic of Ireland. You can read news about the prize and its history, or peruse the list of winners. Also, review the archival list of winners from 1969 to the present.
Past winners include "The English Patient" by Michael Ondaatje and "Disgrace" by J.M. Coetzee.
The Man Booker Prize promotes the finest in fiction by rewarding the very best book of the year. The prize is the world's most important literary award and has the power to transform the fortunes of authors and publishers.
Eleanor Catton was announced as the winner of the 2013 Man Booker Prize for her novel The Luminaries on Tuesday 15 October.
The Luminaries, 2013
by Eleanor Catton
‘There was this large world of rolling time and shifting spaces, and that small, stilled world of horror and unease – they fit inside each other, a sphere within a sphere.’
It is 1866, and Walter Moody has come to make his fortune upon the West Coast goldfields.
On the night of his arrival, he stumbles across a tense gathering of twelve local men, who have met in secret to discuss a series of unsolved crimes. A wealthy man has vanished, a whore has tried to end her life, and an enormous sum of money has been discovered in the home of a luckless drunk. Moody is soon drawn into the mystery: a network of fates and fortunes that is as complex and exquisitely patterned as the night sky.
REVIEWS FOR THE LUMINARIES
“The Luminaries is an extraordinary piece of fiction. It is full of narrative, linguistic and psychological pleasures, and has a fiendishly clever and original structuring device. Written in pitch-perfect historical register, richly evoking a mid-19th century world of shipping and banking and goldrush boom and bust, it is also a ghost story, and a gripping mystery. It is a thrilling achievement and will confirm for critics and readers that Catton is one of the brightest stars in the international writing firmament.” — Granta
“The Luminaries is a true achievement. Catton has built a lively parody of a 19th-century novel, and in so doing created a novel for the 21st, something utterly new. The pages fly.” – Bill Roorbach, New York Times Book Review
“A finely wrought fun house of a novel. Enjoy the ride.”- Chris Bohjalian, The Washington Post
“An 848-page dish so fresh that one continues to gorge, long past being crammed full of goodness. Nearly impossible to put down, it’s easily the best novel I’ve read this year.” – Mike Fischer, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
“Go ahead and call Eleanor Catton a prodigy. At 28, she’s the youngest author ever to win Britain’s prestigious Man Booker Prize for THE LUMINAIRES, which warrants every one of its imposing – yet surprisingly breezy – 848 pages.” Stephan Lee, Entertainment Weekly
“The type of novel that you will devour only to discover that you can’t find anything of equal scope and excitement to read once you have finished…Do yourself a favour and read The Luminaries.” –The Independent
“Irresistible, masterful, compelling…The Luminaries has a gripping plot that is cleverly unravelled to its satisfying conclusion, a narrative that from the first page asserts that it is firmly in control of where it is taking us…[Catton is] a mistress of plot and pacing.” -The Telegraph (5-star review)
“Every sentence of this intriguing tale set on the wild west coast of southern New Zealand during the time of its goldrush is expertly written, every cliffhanger chapter-ending making us beg for the next to begin.” -The Guardian
“Note-perfect… [Catton's] authority and verve are so impressive that she can seemingly take us anywhere; each time, we trust her to lead us back…A remarkable accomplishment.” -Globe and Mail
“Beautifully rendered…Momentous. An exquisite world unto itself.” -Maclean’s
“A remarkable achievement…Intricate, painstakingly detailed and deliciously readable…A novel that can be enjoyed for its engrossing entirety, as well as for the literary gems bestowed on virtually every page.” -Quill & Quire (starred review)
“As beautiful as it is triumphant.” -Daily Mail
“Falling in love with a fictional person is one of the greatest pleasures in life, Canadian-born writer Eleanor Catton believes. By the time readers have finished The Luminaries, they will have been enchanted by many of her characters, as they slowly reveal themselves through the novel’s intriguing web of interactions and relationships.” -Toronto Star
To call it “daringly ambitious in its reach and scope doesn’t really do it justice… There is a ludic quality in all this that is infectious: You pick up the author’s joy in her enterprise.” -Martin Rubin, The Wall Street Journal
“Several of the characters… are moving and even heartbreaking.” She continues, “There will no doubt be readers who will nestle voluptuously into its 19th-century voice and think no more of larger matters…There are others who will treat The Luminaries like the fantastic puzzle it most certainly is. This is the rare novel that works beautifully on both levels, and that understands that each of these aspects is like a magnetic pole: The field between them is where all the power lies.” – Laura Miller, Salon
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