The Luminaries (2013) by Eleanor Catton is historical fiction written in the style of a 19th-century serial novel. It is set during the gold rush on the South Island of New Zealand in the 1860s. A whodunit told using two overlapping timelines and extensive flashbacks, it deploys motifs of astrology to paint a detailed portrait of class, gender, and conflict on the colonial frontier. The novel won the Man Booker Prize in 2013; at the time, Catton was the youngest-ever Man Booker Prize winner, and The Luminaries was the longest novel chosen for the award. Another novel by Catton is Birnam Wood (2023).

This study guide uses the hardcover Granta edition, published in 2013.

Content Warning: The source material uses offensive anti-Asian and antisemitic language as well as derogatory terms for sex workers; these are only referenced in quotations in this guide. The source material also includes depictions of drug use and addiction, violence against women, and suicide.

Plot Summary

Walter Moody, a young Scotsman, disembarks in Hokitika, New Zealand, on January 27, 1866, planning to seek his fortune in the goldfields. Worn out from his journey, he checks into the Crown Hotel, where he stumbles upon a clandestine meeting: 12 men have gathered to discuss a series of mysterious and troubling events that recently shook up their town. On the night of January 14, 1866, a hermit named Crosbie Wells died in his cabin under suspicious circumstances and was found by a Parliamentary candidate, Alistair Lauderback; the young and wealthy Emery Staines disappeared without a trace; the sex worker Anna Wetherell was found on the road into town, collapsed and incoherent; and the ship the Godspeed, captained by the brutish Francis Carver, left town abruptly in the middle of the night. The following day, the Reverend Devlin found a mysterious unsigned contract, witnessed by Crosbie, for a gift of 2,000 pounds from Staines to Anna. While clearing out Crosbie’s cottage to prepare for the sale of his estate, the commission merchant Harald Nilssen found 4,000 pounds’ worth of gold. Shortly thereafter, a woman named Lydia Wells arrived in town, claiming to be Crosbie’s widow and insisting that she was entitled to the gold.

The 12 men at the Crown Hotel recount all these events to Moody and ask for his assistance in untangling the plot. These men represent the diversity of Hokitika society—they include a goldfields magnate, a banker, an indentured Chinese worker, and a Māori man who had befriended Crosbie. Each of these men narrates a section of the mystery, revealing his connection to the events that unfolded. The novel also employs an astrological organizational structure, and these 12 men and other major characters in the novel are associated with zodiac signs and celestial bodies; their relationships and interactions mirror the movements of these celestial entities and are affected by them.

As the novel proceeds, some elements of the conspiracy become clearer. Carver and Lydia are old friends and co-conspirators. After Lydia marries Crosbie in another gold-mining town named Dunedin, she learns that Crosbie’s half-brother is none other than the politician Alistair Lauderback. When Crosbie strikes a jackpot of 4,000 pounds’ worth of gold, Lydia and Carver conspire to get a hold of one of Lauderback’s ships so that they can steal Crosbie’s gold and smuggle it out of Dunedin. Lydia seduces Lauderback and then creates a paper trail to confirm their affair. Under threat of blackmail, Lauderback agrees to sell Carver his ship, the Godspeed. Lydia then steals Crosbie’s gold and has it sewn into dresses to be smuggled out of Dunedin. They also steal Crosbie’s identity and use it in the transaction to buy the ship. While they are hatching these plans, young Anna Wetherell arrives in Dunedin and is tricked by Lydia into staying in her brothel. Anna sleeps with Crosbie and becomes pregnant with his child.

Crosbie gets wind of Lydia and Carver’s plan. With Anna’s help, he attacks Carver and arranges to have the chest with the gold-lined dresses taken off the Godspeed, although he is forced to leave town before he can get a hold of it again. He ends up in Hokitika, where Staines helps him cash in the last gold nugget that he has left so he can purchase land to build a cottage. Lydia does not know Crosbie is in Hokitika. To punish Anna for sleeping with her husband, she sends her to Hokitika to work as a sex worker under the management of Mannering. There, Anna and Staines fall in love. After an altercation with Carver, who is in Hokitika to find out why Staines’s gold mine, which he has invested in is not producing, Anna loses the child.

While in Hokitika, Carver learns that Crosbie is living there as well. He is determined to have his revenge on him and to reclaim his gold, which he presumes Crosbie has. He breaks into Crosbie’s cabin and gives him laudanum, which may or may not have been the cause of Crosbie’s death; Carver then abruptly leaves town on the Godspeed. Earlier that same evening, Staines, who is intoxicated on opium, wanders down to the docks looking for Anna. At this time, he is probably accidentally nailed into a shipping crate that is then loaded on to the Godspeed, and he goes missing for months. Later, Staines contradicts this theory, claiming to have been in the opium den the whole time he was missing. The 4,000 pounds’ worth of gold found in Crosbie’s cabin is in fact Crosbie’s, though it arrives there in a circuitous manner, after Anna buys the crate containing Lydia’s dresses.

Weeks later, Staines reappears in Crosbie’s cabin. After he heals from his injuries, he is tried for dereliction of duty and other charges related to the events. He is charged with nine months of hard labor. However, he is delighted to be reunited with his true love, Anna. At the trials, Moody acts as the defense lawyer for Anna and Staines; after this, Moody leaves town to seek his fortune elsewhere. Carver is arrested for his role in the events, but he is mysteriously murdered on his way to the jailhouse. The novel hints that Carver’s killer is possibly Crosbie’s friend, the Māori man named Te Rau Tauwhare.