It's a rare joy to find such raw feelings of awe conveyed through several hundred pages. In Ascension by Martin MacInnes (Infinite Ground) explores several mysteries: the origins of life, whether humans are alone in the universe, and the fraught complexities of family. Longlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize, it delivers both satisfying, well-researched scientific information and a complex narrative.
Leigh is a marine biologist who's fascinated with ancient underwater organisms. She's called to help investigate a confounding, newly discovered marine trench which appears to be deeper than the Mariana Trench. A series of strange events occur during the deep-sea exploration, leading to further curious phenomena that, somehow, seem connected. Through it all, Leigh struggles with her duty to her family and a desire to escape entirely into her work. Still, her family shadows her--no matter how far she runs.
MacInnes beautifully renders the sea and sky as thought-provoking parallels. "I swam in the small cove near the guest-house last thing in the evenings, diving and playing in the stringy white surf, watching the stars become clearer each night as the moon waned.... I imagined a life of this, in close contact, as I saw it, with the stuff of the world." Readers experience Leigh's transcendent relationship with the sea and sky, and are brought with her into closer communion with wonder through her attention and openness to awe-inspiring nature. MacInnes's evocative writing serves as a profound meditation on science, the human condition, and what it means to be alive. --Carol Caley, writer