Predictions for the Booker Prize 2023 from someone who will never be able to predict the winner of the Booker Prize

Nov 22, 2023

Before we really crack into this, a bit of a Booker Prize yarn. I usually only write recommendations/reviews of books that are 5 stars (for me) or very close to this. There is only one of the Booker Prize list which hit this mark for me, and this is the book that I am recommending to take it out. Do I think it will actually win? I am not sure. Your guess is as good as mine!

(Photo credit for the above photo from the Booker Prize)

Sometimes the winners of these prizes have gone completely over my head. One of the previous winners has taken out the title of the worst book I have EVER read. I won’t name it here because naming and shaming is not what we do here, but this does provide some context for this review in that the chances of me liking, enjoying and endorsing the winner are probably quite slim.

What I can do, I think, is appreciate why these books have made it to this list. I can see why each of them are here even if I didn’t necessarily enjoy them. I can appreciate exquisite writing. I can appreciate literary quality. I can appreciate uniqueness. After reading many of these books, I often thought, “I have never read anything like this!” It would not surprise me if any of these books take out the top prize. What I will do in this review is give you my thoughts, rank them, and let you know what I think the chances of the book winning are.

The winners are announced on 27 November 2023, so I will let you know in my review that week whether I can expect a call to be on the selection or judging panel next year.

The six books on the shortlist are:

Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery
The Bee Sting by Paul Murray
Western Lane by Chetna Maroo
This Other Eden by Paul Harding
Prophet Song by Paul Lynch

I give 75% odds to Paul winning the Booker Prize…

Let’s begin!

In sixth place (and of course this book now has 90% odds of winning by virtue of simply being placed last) is This Other Eden by Paul Harding. My least favourite of the Booker Prize Pauls. This novel is inspired by the true story of the once racially integrated Malaga Island off the coast of Maine, and effectively, its colonisation. I really liked the premise of the book, and thought I would enjoy it. I probably would’ve picked it up based on the subject matter alone but this missed the mark. The execution fell short for me. This has an interesting writing style that I struggled to get on board with. Even though a very short book, I found it quite hard to get through. There were no speech marks which irritated me. Maybe if I had listened to this as an audiobook I would’ve enjoyed it more? This book is almost told in the first person as it has observations and thoughts from the characters but not in first person. It is so hard to describe! Needless to say, this book was not for me, and is firmly in the 6/6 spot.

(Writing this has really cemented why I only write reviews of the books I enjoy. I feel dirty saying mean things about books. Eek! How am I going to finish this review?!)

Fifth place for me is If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery (this is such a great surname – say it out loud). Now.. this book is almost like a series of short stories but with the same characters. There were certain of the short stories that I simply loved. I loved the characters. I enjoyed the style of writing. BUT the stories all put together was not right. My disclaimer here is that I do not enjoy short stories. I will very rarely read them so this one was going to have to work really hard to win me over. I see why it is in the shortlist. It is very unique, and it does have so many good things going for it, but I just struggled with connecting the dots between the chapters. Will it surprise me if it wins? No, it would not. It actually does make me want to look into what the rules are for which format is eligible to be considered for the Booker Prize but I won’t. If it is there, it must be eligible right? Maybe it isn’t short stories and I am just not learned enough to appreciate this type of book? That is probably it.

In fourth place is Western Lane by Chetna Maroo. I appreciate that many of these books were very short which means I could read them in one sitting but I found myself wishing this one was longer. Essentially, this is a book about grief and how a father and his daughters cope following the loss of their wife and mother. The sport of squash is used as a coping mechanism, and much of the book is centered around the squash court. One of the things that I will remember about this book is the emotion. It was almost very emotional without being explicit about it. There were many things left unsaid, and the reader had to do a lot of reading between the lines. The reason this one isn’t ranked higher for me is because I wanted more from it. I would’ve liked for the emotion to have been expanded on. I want depth! It only touched the surface of things for me. In saying this, I think the author did a very good job of portraying things from 11-year-old, main character, Gopi’s perspective. This could be why some things weren’t explored more? I will not be surprised if this one wins either, although I do think this is probably an outlier.

In third place, and probably my most controversial rating is Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein. This is a first-person account of someone descending into madness. This will not appeal to everyone. This book has quite a low rating on Goodreads and I have read many scathing reviews of this online. This book is beautifully written. Many of these books have a poetic character to them, and this one is certainly poetic. This book wins the most unique book on the shortlist and I think that is why there is a love/hate relationship with it. I would not say that I loved this, but it has been a few weeks now since I finished reading them all and this is the one that I can remember the most without having to look back on my notes. I haven’t read anything like it. This book made me think about perspectives – and how unreliable they are. As we read this book, we come to learn that the perspective of the main character cannot be trusted. What is true? What isn’t? And how will I know? This book has themes around the role of women, and I would classify this as feminist literature. I am not sure if the author would so I might look that up.. This book is also about what happens when people don’t have agency. I think if this one wins, there will be a lot of disappointed people in the online world. I think this would be the most controversial winner, and so I am quietly rooting for this one. Who doesn’t love an underdog? All will be revealed soon, I guess.

Taking out the second spot, Prophet Song by Paul Lynch. This is the book which I have seen the most positive feedback about online. I suspect this will be the book which most people want to win. This book is powerful and poetic. I think with everything going on in the world at the moment, it makes you stand up and feel on edge about the way power can be yielded. This book is set in Ireland, where a populist government has been in power for two years. They have loaded the judiciary with their people, implemented unreasonable emergency measures and appointed a secret police to oversee enforcement. Our main character, Eilish is a scientist and mother of four and her trade unionist husband is arrested for protesting the new regime. He doesn’t come home. Eilish’s life and freedoms and eroded day by day. My heart was in my mouth as things go from bad to worse. Reading this book is a real exercise in empathy.

There are things not to like in this book – sometimes the language is too poetic – unnecessarily so. There is also limited punctuation. I am not sure what these people have against speech marks but clearly this is a thing now. I can see why so many people love this book. Chances are high for this Paul taking out the win – well if the power of the people is anything to go by (this book would have us believe this is not the case.. oh the irony).

Is anyone still reading or did you skip to the end? It may well have been quicker for you to read the shortlist yourself rather than this review!

Drum roll please….

My pick to win the Booker Prize for 2023, and my favourite of the six is The Bee Sting by Paul Murray. This is the heftiest of the shortlist at 656 pages. (Look at the photo of the shortlist – you can pretty much read three of the others to one Bee Sting). Even though it was long, I was gripped by this book. It is intense and unputdownable. The ending will ruin you in the best possible way. There is a real gift in an author who can write so many different characters so convincingly. This book follows a family of four – mother, Imelda; father, Dickie; teenage daughter, Cass; and son, PJ. Each character is a main character. They are dealing with the aftermath of the financial crash of 2008. Each section is written from the perspective of a different character. Don’t get me wrong. There were some sections I liked more than others, and some which I wished were shorter. But each character’s section is written in different styles. It is almost like each character was written by a different person, that is how immersive and well done it is. Similarly to Study for Obedience, this book makes you think about perception versus reality. I loved watching how things were unfolding and the different perspectives and ways the characters experience the same thing.

This is my pick to win. When you boil it down, this book is simply the one which I enjoyed the most. 4.5 stars for this one from me.

So now we wait and see who will take it out, and next week we will return to our regular content because life is too short to read bad books.

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