Booker winner M. John Harrison says there is interest in filming 'The End of Everything'

M. John Harrison has won the Booker Prize, and he has already been asked about a film. The 81-year-old author told Deadline that there is interest in adapting his winning novel, The End of Everything, though talks have not advanced far enough to discuss in detail.

The book was published by Serpent's Tail, an imprint of Profile Books, and it is the first Booker win for the author. Harrison had served as a Booker judge in 2022. Booker Chief Executive Gaby Wood called him the first Booker winner to come out of the genuine science fiction world, a description that fits the book's premise.

The story follows a beachcomber, someone who searches the shoreline for salvage, living on the English coast after a disaster. He finds a mysterious object in the sea and carries it inland. Along the way the novel introduces the iGhetti, shape-shifting alien entities that are central to the plot.

Harrison said he would prefer a film to a television series. He also described the kind of picture he has in mind: a European-style film, closer to a demanding French film or the work of Hungarian director Béla Tarr, known for long, slow takes. He told Deadline that he pictured the scenes as he wrote them.

He also admitted a late change of heart. He had planned to put "A Film" in the title, so it would read The End of Everything: A Film, but he lost his nerve at the last minute and left the subtitle off.

For readers new to how book adaptations start, interest from a producer or studio is often the first step, and it can take years before a project has a director, a cast or a budget. For now, the news is simply that the author would like to see his book on screen, and that other people have shown interest in it too.