The shortlist for the “Booker Prize 2026”: https://bit.ly/4AnZYYh, the leading literary award in the English-speaking world for a single work of fiction, has been announced.
Spanning a range of genres – from dystopian fiction to contemporary realism, from campus satire to historical fiction – the shortlisted books explore what it means to be human in an ever-changing world and the communities and events that shape us. Both intimate and epic, personal and political, they provide mediations on familial bonds, identity, shame, love, loneliness, survival and the ultimate unknowability of others. They are moving, pacey, funny, violent, intriguing, horrifying and hopeful.
The interior lives of a rich cast of characters are vividly depicted by the shortlisted authors, from a beachcomber eking out an existence on the coast of Kent to an out-of-work actor paid to attend university lectures zipped inside a black leather bag for a psychology experiment; from a reluctant monarch in a medieval court under threat by scheming courtiers to a son returning home to his repressive father in a traditional Calvinist island community in the Outer Hebrides; from a teacher with a seemingly comfortable life in coastal Massachusetts who is harbouring a secret, to a survivor of a murderous homophobic attack in 1980s Kingston, Jamaica, set on retribution.
The shortlist
- The End of Everything by M. John Harrison
- The Disappearers by Marlon James
- Black Bag by Luke Kennard
- May We Feed the King by Rebecca Perry
- The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout
- John of John by Douglas Stuart
The judges
The shortlist of six books has been selected by the 2026 judging panel, chaired by celebrated classicist, writer and broadcaster Mary Beard. Beard is joined by award-winning poet and writer Raymond Antrobus; musician, writer and broadcaster Jarvis Cocker; journalist, editor and critic Rebecca Liu; and Booker Prize-shortlisted novelist, poet and essayist Patricia Lockwood.
Mary Beard, Chair of the Booker Prize 2026 judges, says:
‘It was a meeting none of the judges is likely to forget – getting together to whittle down the 13 extraordinary novels on the longlist to just six. It was fun. Most of these books were beginning to feel like old friends after at least two readings. And it was painful to have to let some of them go, with their now bent spines and dog-eared pages, their brilliant capacity to make us think, argue and sometimes disagree.
’We did not start out with a checklist of the different types of books we wanted to see represented in the final six, or the kinds of authors or subject matter. But when we looked at the lineup of our shortlist, neatly propped up against one another, almost glowing, we were happy that we had showcased many of the strengths of contemporary English language fiction. These novels range from the hilarious to the discomfiting, from the frighteningly strange to the alarmingly domestic, from the powerfully shocking to the intriguingly understated. In them, we meet characters from different countries and different centuries, created by authors 40 years apart, new talent and well-known favourites.
‘This is writing at its best. There’s plenty to enjoy, some blissful escapism and prose to die for (‘I just wish I could have written that’ kept going through my mind). But there is also plenty here to change the way we see the world, to surprise us and to challenge our certainties.
‘We hope that you get as much out of the books on our shortlist as we have.’
Further reading
- ’Everything you need to know about the shortlist’
- ’What the judges say about the 2026 shortlist’
- ’Shortlist reading guides’
- ’Shortlist extracts’
Shortlist events and winner announcements
The Times & Sunday Times Cheltenham Literary Festival – 2.30pm GMT, Saturday, 10 October 2026
Gaby Wood, Chief Executive of the Booker Prize Foundation will host Cheltenham Festival’s annual introduction to the six shortlisted books and their authors who will join the event both in-person and virtually.
Tickets are available to book here.
Shortlist event at Southbank Centre: 7.30pm GMT, Sunday, 8 November, 2026, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, London
The prize’s annual shortlist readings, featuring the authors reading from and discussing their books, are returning for the 2026 prize season and will take place on Sunday, 8 November in the Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, London.
The event will be chaired by Sara Collins and tickets are available here.
Details of all Booker Prize events can be found here.
The Booker Prize 2026 ceremony will take place on the evening of Monday, 9 November at Old Billingsgate in London and will be broadcast live in a special edition of BBC Radio 4’s flagship arts programme Front Row at 9.30pm GMT and then available on BBC Sounds. The ceremony will be livestreamed on the Booker Prizes’ social channels, along with interviews from the red carpet. The winner will receive £50,000 and a trophy named Iris (after 1978 winner Iris Murdoch).
Get involved
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What do you think of the 2026 shortlisted titles? Which have you read and what will be added to your TBR pile? Add your comments below, or click any title above to leave a review.
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