THE LUMINARIES | ELEANOR CATTON | 2013

Another very long book at 848 pages and it’s very heavy too. Too heavy to read easily on the beach propped up by a back rest of sand. This is where I started to read it but gave up to go inside with a glass of wine. Maybe the wine wasn’t a good idea either as this is quite a complex book. If you take the premise of the stars being in alignment with the chapters and you’re of an astronomical bent then you’ll probably understand this book better than I did.

Walter Moody goes to the goldfields of New Zealand in 1866. He arrives in a storm when twelve local men are holding a meeting to discuss some mysterious events. He’s drawn into the story with its ups and downs coinciding with the stars of the night sky. This is a tour de force of imagination and storytelling about money, gold and ships and a cast of characters including a drunk and a vanished prostitute.

It’s all pretty clever and well-written and composed and the narrative fits together nicely. But to me it all seemed just a little bit too clever and not once after finishing all those 848 pages did I ever think about it again.

It won the Booker Prize so that shows I know nothing about what constitutes prize winning writing!