Irish writer Paul Lynch wins Booker Prize for 'Prophet Song'

London: Irish writer Paul Lynch won the 2023 Booker Prize on Sunday for his novel 'Prophet Song', the story of a family and a country on the brink of catastrophe as an imaginary Irish government veers towards tyranny.

The novel, Paul Lynch’s fifth, seeks to show the unrest in Western democracies and their indifference towards disasters such as the implosion of Syria.

“From that first knock at the door, ‘Prophet Song’ forces us out of our complacency as we follow the terrifying plight of a woman seeking to protect her family in an Ireland descending into totalitarianism,” Esi Edugyan, chair of the Booker’s 2023 judges, said.

“This is a triumph of emotional storytelling, bracing and brave.”

Paul Lynch, who was previously the chief film critic of Ireland’s Sunday Tribune newspaper, said he wanted readers to understand totalitarianism by heightening the dystopia with the intense realism of his writing.