I picked up Flesh because one of my favorite singers, Dua Lipa, recommended it for her book club. I’ve logged many miles running to her song Dance the Night Away from the Barbie soundtrack. So imagine my delight when I learned she’s also a serious reader—a library champion with her own book club and podcast.

At her live interview with author David Szalay at the New York Public Library, she said something that caught my attention:

“Storytelling is about connection, courage, and community.”

Which felt like the perfect echo to everything I’ve been thinking about this month—group singing, entrainment, courage, and the ways we come into rhythm with one another.

Flesh, which just won the prestigious Booker Prize, is a spare and quietly powerful novel that follows István, a Hungarian man who rises from a rough childhood to wealth and status in London. I read it quickly and found it strangely compelling—partly because of what Szalay leaves out. Whole sections of István’s life happen off the page: incarceration, military service in Iraq, even major emotional events.

Critics noted that István’s most common line is simply, “Okay.” Honestly, I can’t believe I loved a book with so many “Okays” in it. Szalay himself admitted, “He (Istvan) doesn’t explain himself to the reader. He isn’t very articulate.”

One of the Booker Prize judges said:

“We loved how much was revealed without us being overly aware that it was being revealed…Watching this man grow, age, and learning so much about him—despite him, in a way.”

István is a man who rarely uses his voice. He moves through his life slightly out of sync with others—longing for connection but often unable (or unwilling) to say what he feels. The novel’s gaps and silences mirror the gaps inside him.

For all its spareness, Flesh becomes a powerful reminder that:

Connection asks something of us: voice, courage, and a willingness to step into the shared rhythm of being human.

I don’t know if I really captured the book for you, but I found it thought-provoking, unusually crafted, and a fitting companion to everything I’ve been reflecting on this month. “Okay?”