The Luminaries
Eleanor Catton
Little, Brown
9780316074315
Winner of the 2013 Man Booker Prize
I’ve woken up around 4am the past couple of nights thinking about this book. My thoughts on it aren’t final but this is a space where conversations happen, and I need to talk.
The Luminaries is an engaging page-turner, a mystery set in a 19th Century New Zealand gold town. It’s a successful pastiche of the Victorian novel, with omniscient narration (informing and withholding from the reader at will; describing the physical appearance and temperament of characters in detail). The Luminaries is also an intellectual feat, due to its engagement with the astrological calendar and with each chapter being half the length of the one previous.
It begins with Walter Moody, interrupting a private meeting of twelve men at the Crown Hotel in Hokitika. He becomes the listener for their combined tale, involving death, gold, prostitution, mistaken identities, shipping crates, opium, and elements that will remain mysterious (due to an implied element of the fantastical) at the book’s end. The second half of the book details events and incidents that have unfolded after the knowledge gained at the Crown meeting, gives us more insight into the peripheral (or ‘planetary’) characters involved, and immerses the reader in the original events, from a different point of view.
I’m a big fan of Catton’s book The Rehearsal and I found The Luminaries a delightful, fast-paced read. Having read her two (very different) books I have so much admiration for Catton’s intellect, ambition, range and depth. The details of Hokitika and the range of fascinating (and often nasty) characters reminded me of watching a season of Deadwood. I wondered if at the end I had read it too quickly, though, as I wasn’t sure whether I’d missed one crucial ‘nugget’ of information, or whether it was supposed to be slightly open-ended; that the reader was supposed to draw their own final conclusion from the information given. I will have to read it again, as I know the whole first section will become richer after the perspectives gained in the rest of the book, particularly regarding Anna Wetherell (of the ‘old profession’) and boy wonder Emery Staines. I think there is also a lot more to think about in regards to the Chinese goldsmith Quee Long.
I’d love to discuss the book, if you’ve read it, but let’s mark any spoilery comments so those yet to experience The Luminaries know to avoid them… And I’m still travelling, so do forgive me if I end up taking a little while to reply.
