Orbital (2024) By Samantha Harvey

"The earth, from here, is like heaven. It flows with colour. A burst of hopeful colour. When we’re on that planet we look up and think heaven is elsewhere, but here is what the astronauts and cosmonauts sometimes think: maybe all of us born to it have already died and are in an afterlife."

I have been hoping to read Samantha Harvey's Booker Prize winner for some time now. My peers seemed to enjoy it, and I have always been partial to fictional novels that have space as a key setting or feature. With such a positive reception from many readers, it felt like this relatively short novel would be a very solid choice of reading. It was also nice to read something a little shorter than my usual read - it made it feel a little more relaxed.

"We matter greatly and not at all. To reach some pinnacle of human achievement only to discover that your achievements are next to nothing and that to understand this is the greatest achievement of any life, which itself is nothing, and also much more than everything."

Something that struck me, and then was reaffirmed on several occasions, was the frequent listing throughout the book. I realise that this was done for effect, but it grew extremely tiresome and repetitive for me. I could not seem to escape a list of some sort or another. It felt more like Harvey was trying to emphasise how much research she had done, regardless of how necessary it was. It is a harsh criticism, I will admit, but, as stated, it was a very tiresome aspect of the book.

"The planet is shaped by the sheer amazing force of human want, which has changed everything, the forests, the poles, the reservoirs, the glaciers, the rivers, the seas, the mountains, the coastlines, the skies, a planet contoured and landscaped by want."

Considering how small the book is, I also found that it dragged very noticeably. It took me a lot longer than I was hoping to get through it, mainly because it was such a slow and dull read. I don't mind a more gently-paced or contemplative piece of literature, but it has to resonate, and this novel rarely did, unfortunately. It was extremely sentimental - too much so, in fact - to the point that it felt more wishy-washy than effective.

"You might regard in wonder these men walking on the moon but you must never forget the price humanity pays for its moments of glory, because humanity doesn't know when to stop..."

Some of the descriptions were compelling, and the characters were fairly interesting, but everything felt like background noise - nothing felt important. I was occasionally driven to reflection and mental exploration, but this was not nearly as frequent as I was hoping. I enjoyed a lot of the language that Harvey used, though - her words were very eloquently selected, it must be said.

"How are we writing the future of humanity? We're not writing anything, it's writing us. We're windblown leaves. We think we're the wind, but we're just the leaf."

Unfortunately, this was not as strong a book as I was hoping it would be. It was fine - a semi-interesting, well-worded, and occasionally imaginative novella, but certainly not the modern classic it has been touted as being. I have read far better, and far more contemplative fiction in the last few years - this will not be one that lives long in my memory, nor one that will prompt a re-read anytime soon. Perhaps my expectations were a little too high, although, I would maintain that they were at a reasonable level.

"Because who can look at man’s neurotic assault on the planet and find it beautiful? Man’s hubris. A hubris so almighty it’s matched only by his stupidity."