The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton Became the Longest Novel to Win the Man Booker Prize

The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

Eleanor Catton, the New Zealand author, at the age of just 28 years, became the youngest ever winner of the Man Booker Prize for her novel The Luminaries on 15 October 2013 at the London's Guildhall.

Her 832-page novel The Luminaries is the story of 19th-century goldfields, which won 50000 Pound Man Booker Prize 2013 along with a trophy, and Emmanuel Roman.  It is important to note that The Luminaries is also the longest work to win this prize in the history of 45 years of Man Booker Prize.

The Luminaries is the longest ever book to win this Prize, beating Hilary Mantel's 672-page Wolf Hall which received the Man Booker Prize 2009.

About The Luminaries

• The novel entitled The Luminaries is set on the goldfields of New Zealand in 1866. It was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2013 earlier and eventually also won the prize.
• The Luminaries is the second novel by Eleanor Catton and was published by Granta in September 2013.
• It is primarily a murder mystery set in New Zealand and has an astrology theme running throughout.
• Robert Macfarlane, Chair of the panel of judges described it as “animated by a weird struggle between compulsion and conversion: within its pages, men and women proceed according to their fixed fates, while gold – as flakes, nuggets, coins and bars – ceaselessly shifts its shapes around them.”
• Eleanor Catton was just 25 years old when she started the book The Luminaries.