These are the 6 best books of the year – according to the jury of the Booker Prize 2024

It is the most important British literary prize: the prestigious onethe one since 1969the best English-language novelpublished in the United Kingdom. Each winner receives £50,000. The award is so popular that the ceremony is broadcast live on British television every year.

Whoever wins the prize is determined each year by a jury made up of opinion leaders from literary critics, writers, literary scholars and public figures.

According to the jury of theBest book of 2024 is Samantha Harvey'sorbits. Harvey has received nothing but praise for it so far. Not only that she withorbitswas also nominated for other book prizes such as the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction and the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize, and media outlets such as The New Yorker and The Guardian also praise Harvey's novel. And the latter sum it up pretty well when they write: “Supernatural nature writing. A short and profound study of well-known human fears against the backdrop of monumental descriptions of swirling weather conditions and rotating continents.” It goes inorbitsnamely six astronauts floating through space in a space station. The two women and four men from different nations are literally disconnected from the world and can only see their home from a distance through a small window. And how the protagonists' thoughts and feelings change, expand and contract is really great writing art and powerorbitsa worthy winner of the Booker Prize 2024. The British author Max Porter wrote: “This novel is so great that as a reader you have to expand your heart to take it all in.” There is nothing more to say about it.

Wow, what a novel! A novel that fits our times so perfectly that it sends shivers down your spine. Anne Michaels beginsTime pathson a battlefield during a world war, from where a wounded man looks out into the starry winter night and ponders his thoughts - that is the starting point for leaps of thought and stories. He thinks of his great-granddaughter, a Doctor Without Borders, of Marie Curie, of early photography, of Lagrange's theory of mechanics. This creates a tightly woven kaleidoscope of love and loyalty across generations and wars, which was rightly on the Booker Prize shortlist. 208 pages full of prosaic beauty.

WithJamesthe great American writer Percival Everett invented Mark Twain's literary classicThe Adventures of Huckleberry Finnnew - and that makes it one of the ten best books of the year, and not just in the opinion of the, but also in the opinion of the Booker Prize jury. In Twain, Jim, the slave who accompanies Huck down the Mississippi, was a stupid, simple man, but inJames, in which Everett tells the story from Jim's perspective, it becomes clear that Jim is just playing dumb. Because he knows that if the white people knew how intelligent he is, that would be his downfall. When he is about to be sold to Jim in New Orleans, he instead flees north to freedom with Huck and keeps getting into trouble together with Huck.Jamesis an incredibly great novel that retells a classic of US literature, modernizes it and thereby makes it immortal once again.

The monastery. A place full of myths, infinitely charged with feelings, the knout of the church towers over everything. And yet that's exactly where a Sydney city girl went, even though God knows she's not a believer. But she is stressed, tired, broken - so she has decided to spend some time in the monastery in the Monaro Plains to regain her strength. Now she has been there much longer than she originally planned. The reason is that exactly what she had hoped for happened: an intensive examination of herself, with essential questions about life, love and death. And author Charlotte Wood has published the insights gained in the course of this focus on one's own inner beingdays with mevery worth reading. In it, Wood creates scenarios of how one can successfully deal with all of life's many adversities. And it's worth reading, as the Booker Prize jury found.

American PsychoAuthor Bret Easton Ellis describes Rachel Kushner as “the most exciting author of her generation” – and the Booker Prize jury also praised her novelCreation Lakeecstatic. In Germany the book bears the titleLake of Creation, but will not be published here until mid-April. So if you can't stand it anymore, you should go back to the original. And we can promise: it's worth it! It's about former CIA spy Sadie Smith, who is sent to southern France by an unnamed client. There she is supposed to infiltrate a group of environmental activists who are suspected of having carried out terrorist attacks. But when she meets Bruno Lacombe, the head of the commune, Sadie, who is actually so hardened, falls more and more under his spell. The Booker Prize jury wrote about the book: “The electrifying thing about this novel is the combination of current politics with a dark counter-history of humanity. Kushner's exciting ideas swept us away. The whole novel is a profound, irresistible page-turner.” We can hardly give you more reading recommendations – even if only in six months (at least in German).

Anyone interested in Yael von der WoudensIn her housewill have to wait until the end of January - or read the novel in the original (that's what it's calledThe Safekeep). It's worth it either way, because according to the Booker Prize jury, it's one of the best books of the year (or next year). What is it about? It takes place in the early 1960s in the Dutch countryside. At the center of the story is Isabel, who lives alone in the large family house and is somewhat content there. That changes when her brother moves his girlfriend Eva there, who doesn't fit Isabell at all. Isabell hates the change, and Eva kicks some of it. As a result, Isabell has to struggle with a lot of things: from feelings of desire to revenge, dealing with prejudices and coming to terms with her own past. Above all, it is Yael van der Wouden's dense language that makes this debut incredibly dramatic, sharp and brilliant.