Book Review / Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead

 

Great Circle

Maggie Shipstead

Review by Linda M. Castellitto

Analysis / The 2021 Booker shortlist tunes in to the worries of our age

Nadifa Mohamed is sole British writer to make Booker prize shortlist

Booker Prize 2021 shortlist unveiled as race for £50,000 prize hots up

From age 13, Marian Graves is determined to fly. “Her belief that she would fly saturated her world, presented an appearance of absolute truth,” Maggie Shipstead writes in her epic and exciting novel Great Circle. As a girl in 1920s Montana, Marian’s dream seems nigh impossible, but she bargains and sacrifices her way into procuring precious flying lessons—and so discovers an all-consuming, lifelong love of the sky.

Maggie Shipstead / Inherently epic

 

Maggie Shispstead

Maggie Shipstead

Inherently epic

Analysis / The 2021 Booker shortlist tunes in to the worries of our age

Nadifa Mohamed is sole British writer to make Booker prize shortlist

Booker Prize 2021 shortlist unveiled as race for £50,000 prize hots up

BookPage interview by Linda M. Castellitto
May 2021

Maggie Shipstead’s exceptional third novel, Great Circle, was a vast undertaking—but the round-the-globe flight of her aviator protagonist is even more daunting.

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Maggie Shipstead often finds herself in far-flung places such as Italy, Romania, the Himalayas, Antarctica and the South Pacific. Sometimes she goes just for fun, but often it’s in service of her work as a travel writer and novelist. She’s especially drawn to desolate landscapes and polar regions, though she admits that getting there poses a bit of an ethical concern. “You have to burn a lot of carbon,” the author says, “but I do think when people see [these places], they better understand [their] fragility and importance.”