Guest review by Cindy Jefferies: ORBITAL by Samantha Harvey

 

"This jewel of a book is out there, like our beautiful planet in space; silent, modest, wonderful, waiting to be found."

First published in 2001 for children, Cindy Jefferies found success with her Fame School series with Usborne Books, obtaining 22 foreign rights deals. Latterly writing fiction for adults as Cynthia Jefferies, her first title The Outrageous Fortune of Abel Morgan was published in 2018, followed a year later by The Honourable Life of Thomas Chayne, set during the English Civil Wars, followed in 2019. Both titles are now available in paperback.

I can’t think of a more divisive recent novel. Friends and acquaintances either loved or loathed this 2024 title. Ian McEwan’s On Chesil Beach, written in 2007 attracted similar strong emotions. Both are novellas, both were shortlisted for the Booker Prize but McEwan, having won in 1998, dipped out in 2007, while Harvey went on to win in 2024.

Major prize winners are always open to a superfluity of opinions. It goes with the territory. Critics are asked for their reviews, book groups, along with huge numbers of the general, book reading public rush to buy or borrow, so they can see what the fuss is about. So what was the fuss about in 2024?

The major complaint seemed to be that ‘nothing happens’ in Orbital. I beg to differ. Admittedly, in spite of it’s 136 pages I didn’t find it a quick read. Orbital demands attention. Once one does pay the story the compliment of starting off with an open mind, and being ready to concentrate; it, for me at any rate, repays every reading moment. What is there to be said about orbiting the Earth multiple times for nine months? Well, quite a lot as it happens. There are the many facts sprinkled through the narrative. Harvey thanks NASA and ESA for the wealth of information made available and my goodness, these facts don’t disappoint, nor does the way she relates them with her quiet, authority.

The novel rotates with the space station, passing developing weather patterns, ambling past the ink dark Atlantic, or brilliantly lit Europe, over and over again, measuring the hours of astronaut time as if they are living Earth sunrises and sunsets, though at seventeen and a half thousand miles an hour. The pace of the novel suggests Earth time, while for the astronauts the days pass quickly, with so much to do, so much essential exercise, experiments, housekeeping. Hanging in their sleeping bags, asleep, head over heels over head…

And of course there are other stories, the astronaut’s stories. Each individual is out of reach of a loved one to embrace, short of Earth knowledge, though seeing the planet more entirely than anyone living on its surface. Such a disconnect at so much distance, such possible domestic disasters, and yet not one wants to go home early. Hidden illness, the death of a Mother, and yet somehow, the six of them are sufficient unto each others’ equilibrium.

Don’t expect great drama, fallings out, or violence in the space station. A hand’s breadth away from disaster, the metal holds, in spite of its age. And, so do the six men and women within it. This jewel of a book is out there, like our beautiful planet in space; silent, modest, wonderful, waiting to be found.

Orbital is published by Vintage. 

See also Samantha Harvey's The Shapeless Unease, reviewed by Graeme Fife

More of Cindy's choices: 

The Wolf Border by Sarah Hall

The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim

Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller

Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Katherine Rooney

Guest review by Ben Tufnell: IN ASCENSION by Martin MacInnes

 "For all the big ideas, the sheer scale of the story, the narrative is compelling. I was gripped, hurtling headlong towards an astonishing conclusion."

Ben Tufnell is a writer and curator based in London, where he runs Parafin, an art gallery. He has published widely on modern and contemporary art, in particular on artforms that engage with landscape and nature. His short stories have been published by Conjunctions, Litro, Lunate, Storgy and Structo, amongst others, and his debut novel, The North Shore, is published by Fleet.

Close to the opening of this extraordinary novel, the narrator, Leigh, peruses the bookshelves in her mother's office. Femi is a theoretical mathematician and Leigh notes volumes with intimidating titles like Philosophy of Cusp Forms and Ultraparallel Theorem, as well as one bearing only an infinity symbol, a lemniscate, on its spine. It is a sign. That symbol with its interlocking ovoids recurs in many different forms throughout this ingeniously constructed book: in a mysterious message that may be from an extraterrestrial intelligence, in the shape of the Nereus, the spaceship that eventually carries Leigh to the edge of the solar system. Indeed, In Ascension is itself structured like an infinity symbol, a Moebius whose ending returns us to the beginning.

Yet, while taking us on a vast and awe-inspiring journey to the stars, In Ascension is grounded in life on Earth. It is a story about connectedness, about nature and human nature; ecologies, both macro and micro. The linking motif running through the book is water: water as a carrier of life, water as connector, water as protector (the Nereus, named after a Greek sea god, contains an ocean in its hull). MacInnes beautifully evokes a formative moment, when Leigh, swimming near her home in Rotterdam as an escape from her unhappy childhood, has an insight into the interconnectedness of all lifeforms and environments - 'there was no gap separating my body from the living world' - and this notion is a sort of foundation for all that follows.

Leigh becomes a marine biologist specialising in algae.In the near future, against a backdrop of climate collapse, she joins a scientific expedition to investigate a newly-discovered marine vent, which initial readings suggest may be deeper than the Mariana Trench.She and her colleagues speculate about the role thermal vents may have played in the genesis of early lifeforms, even the origin of life itself. As their ship nears the site, anomalous phenomena begin to occur. The leader of the expedition suggests they may have found 'a location of singular importance in the history of life on the planet...a cradle, a garden...' When the expedition attempts to measure the depth of t the trench their initial readings suggest it is 36kms deep, three times that of the Mariana Trench. Subsequent readings suggest it is many, many times deeper than that. It is the series of jaw- dropping moments in a book which challenges our sense of the possible.

Soon after, the focus turns outwards, towards space. A mysterious object, decorated with runes a and symbols is detected passing through the outer solar system. A message is received from the Voyager probe, now billions of miles distant and long presumed inactive. A new propulsion system is developed which will allow a spaceship to travel at hitherto unfeasible speeds.

Leigh develops new algal strains as a source of food ( and psychological comfort, the algae's greenness a potential salve against the sense of loss experienced as our blue-green planet retreats into the distance) for a long extra-planetary journey. She trains as a member of the support crew for the mission, but it is no surprise when she and her colleagues are bumped up to become the primary crew. As the Nereus passes beyond the heliopause (the limit of the sun's influence) things begin to blur, as if the narrative logic of space and time is being stretched and distorted by the vastness of the journey.

There's more, of course, but I've already given so much away. What I will say is that MacInnnes handles his material - and his research, which must have been extensive- deftly. And for all the big ideas, the sheer scale of the story, the narrative is compelling. I was gripped, hurtling headlong towards an astonishing conclusion. However, a word of caution: readers who like their stories neatly tied up may well be frustrated. Readers who enjoy something more open, more speculative, will find In Ascension completely satisfying.

It's a big story, beautifully told, austere and grand, filled with ideas. It is mind-boggling, mind-expanding, enriching. Rightly longlisted for the Booker Prize, I would be amazed if it didn't make the shortlist. Indeed, it's hard to imagine a more ambitious novel being published this year. It gives us the story of a life and a story of life itself.

In Ascension is published by Atlantic Books  

Ben Tufnell's The North Shore was chosen by Adèle as one of her books of the year in our birthday round-up.

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