Booker Prize winner author Samantha Harvey, in conversation, beneath Luke Jerram's Gaia

2024 Booker Prize winner Samantha Harvey will be coming to Sherborne Abbey to discuss her groundbreaking novel, Orbital, beneath Luke Jerram's Gaia.

Samantha Harvey’s 2024 novel, Orbital, is a reflection on the beauty of Earth seen by six astronauts and cosmonauts who are viewing the planet from the International Space Station. As they witness 16 sunrises and sunsets in 24 hours of human time, the sight of different aspects of the land beneath them prompts reveries about Earth’s beauty, fragility and how mankind has altered our beautiful planet.

Louise Troop, from the Sherborne Literary Society, will be in conversation with Samantha Harvey on Friday, 29th August at the Sherborne Abbey to illuminate the reasons behind her extraordinary book, a meditation on life, which has been described by the Guardian as ‘An uplifting book, in every sense’. Harvey not only celebrates the beauty of our planet but also writes about ‘the politics of want’ which has shaped the contours of Earth, ‘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’.

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