Szalay’s sixth novel follows the life of István, an ordinary man whose journey from adolescence to middle age unfolds across Hungary and London. The book begins with a startling event in a modest apartment complex, a moment that sets the tone for a story about masculinity, class, migration, power, and emotional restraint.
It’s a dark book, Doyle said during the ceremony at Old Billingsgate, London, but it’s an absolute joy to read. Written in Szalay’s signature minimalist style, Flesh strips human experience down to its bones, literally and figuratively.
The novel’s raw, unsentimental take on the modern man impressed the judges, which included Sarah Jessica Parker, Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, Kiley Reid, and Chris Power. Doyle described Flesh as a rare portrait of the working-class male psyche, a type we don’t often see represented with such depth.
Reviewers have echoed that sentiment. The Guardian called it a novel about the numbing strangeness of being alive… stylistically, Flesh is all bone.
Szalay’s win came against a formidable shortlist, including Andrew Miller’s The Land in Winter and Kiran Desai’s The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, her long-awaited first release since her 2006 Booker triumph.
Born in Montreal to a Hungarian father and Canadian mother, Szalay was raised in London and now lives in Vienna. His early career in financial advertising inspired his debut, London and the South-East. Over the years, his works, spring, The Innocent, and Turbulence have cemented his reputation as one of modern literature’s sharpest observers of ordinary life.
Reflecting on Flesh, Szalay described it as a novel born in the shadow of failure. After abandoning a years-long project in 2020, he wanted this book to express one simple truth, that existence is a physical experience before it’s anything else.
The win marks the 10th Booker Prize for Jonathan Cape, the Penguin imprint that also published last year’s winner, Orbital by Samantha Harvey.
