The 2026 Booker Prize is well underway, with this year’s longlist of 13 novels now whittled down to a shortlist of six. But which books are in the running for one of literature’s most prestigious awards, who gets to decide the winner, and what else should you know about this year’s prize? We’ve put together a reader’s guide to the 2026 Booker Prize, including a closer look at all 13 longlisted novels and the six that have made the shortlist.
Meet the Judges
“Books are not mirrors: they don’t simply reflect ourselves back to us,” Mary Beard, this year’s Chair of judges, wrote in the announcement. “One of the many important things about fiction is that it helps us see what it might be like not to be us, to begin to understand the perspectives of others, and to imagine what it might be like to see the world differently.”
The Longlist
Chosen from 163 titles written in English and published in the UK and/or Ireland between 1 October 2025 and 30 September 2026. As Mary Beard, Chair of this year’s judges, says: ‘We are confident that our longlist of books has something for everyone.’
The Shadow of the Object
Recovering from an operation in a Mexico City hospital, Flora befriends Wilhelmina, an elderly German woman and collector of antique toys. Their unlikely friendship becomes a meditation on grief, connection and the truths that can be found in the shadows.
The Things We Never Say
Artie Dam is an ordinary Massachusetts teacher with an apparently comfortable life, yet beneath the surface he is quietly consumed by isolation and despair. The Things We Never Say explores loneliness, relationships and the things we keep hidden, even from those closest to us.
The Renovation
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When Dilara hires builders to install a new bathroom after her elderly father moves in, she discovers they have instead created a Turkish prison cell – not a replica, but a portal to a fully functioning jail. Strange, funny and unsettling, The Renovation explores political activism, exile, dementia and the many forms imprisonment can take.
Helen of Nowhere
Following the collapse of his marriage and career, a disgraced university professor known only as ‘Man’ retreats to the countryside in search of a new life. Brief, poetic and surreal, Helen of Nowhere explores masculinity, reinvention and what happens when the life you built for yourself falls apart.
May We Feed the King
In an unnamed medieval court, a reluctant monarch struggles with the demands of royal life. Centuries later, an unnamed curator dresses public displays inside a historic palace. Moving between past and present, May We Feed the King brings these two worlds together in an inventive exploration of history, power and the stories we tell about the past.
All Them Dogs
Deep in West Dublin’s gangland, murderous associates Tony Ward and ‘Flute’ Walsh find their criminal partnership complicated by an unexpected mutual attraction. Brutal yet tender, All Them Dogs explores desire and humanity within a violent, hyper-masculine world.
John of John
Young art graduate John-Calum MacLeod reluctantly returns to his windswept, deeply religious home on the Isle of Harris, where he must resume – and confront – the life he left behind. John of John is an exploration of family, violence, shame and the complicated pull of home.
Black Bag
A struggling actor accepts an unusual role in a university psychology experiment: spend an entire term attending lectures zipped inside a large black bag and observe how the other students react. Inspired by a true story, Black Bag is a twisted campus satire and unconventional love story exploring masculinity, identity and belonging.
The Palm House
Old friends Laura and Edmund spend long evenings together in a Southwark pub, drinking, talking and setting the world to rights. As their conversations circle friendship, family and loss, The Palm House becomes a sharply observed portrait of two people navigating grief and the complicated histories that have shaped them.
The Disappearers
In late 20th-century Jamaica, a gay actor rehearsing for a play is murdered, setting in motion a chain of tragic consequences. Returning to the Jamaica of his Booker Prize-winning A Brief History of Seven Killings, Marlon James explores violence, sexuality and the contradictions of a place he knows intimately.
The Vivisectors
Set in a verdant but crumbling university town populated by fraudulent professors, militant gardeners and abusive mothers, The Vivisectors plunges into academic feuds, cancel-culture conflicts and dysfunctional relationships. Gothic, experimental and darkly comic, it offers an unconventional love story for a fractured world.
Switzy
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Retired executive David boards a private plane across Europe, bound for an assisted suicide clinic in Zurich. Darkly funny and deeply moving, Switzy explores what remains of a person when a lifetime of achievements, relationships, contradictions and compromises is stripped away.
The End of Everything
Set against a backdrop of societal collapse and a mysterious alien invasion, scavenger Phillip Tennant ekes out an existence with his aunt on the Kent coast. Bleakly satirical and dystopian, The End of Everything offers a strange and unsettling vision of a world coming apart.
Could we see another double winner?
There are two former Booker winners in the mix this year. Douglas Stuart won in 2020 with Shuggie Bain, while Marlon James took home the prize in 2015 for A Brief History of Seven Killings. If either wins again, they’ll join a very small club: only J.M. Coetzee, Peter Carey, Hilary Mantel and Margaret Atwood have won the Booker twice. Elizabeth Strout is the only other previously nominated author on this year’s list, having been shortlisted for Oh William! in 2022 and longlisted for My Name Is Lucy Barton in 2016.
Authors by Country
If Chloe Aridjis were to win, she would become the first author of Mexican heritage to win the Booker Prize. If Kenan Orhan were to win, he would become the first writer of Turkish heritage to receive the prize.
More Fun Facts
If you’re looking at page count, Marlon James’s The Disappearers is the biggest commitment at more than 600 pages, while Makenna Goodman’s Helen of Nowhere comes in at just over 140. In fact, six of the 13 longlisted books are under 250 pages. For comparison, the shortest Booker winner to date is Penelope Fitzgerald’s Offshore, at 132 pages, while Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries holds the record at the other end of the scale, with 832 pages.
There’s also a former Booker judge among the authors. M. John Harrison was on the judging panel in 2022 and, at 81, would become the oldest person ever to win the prize. Margaret Atwood currently holds that record after winning jointly at 79 in 2019. At the other end of the age spectrum, Djamel White is the youngest author on this year’s longlist at 28.
Publishing-wise, the longlist includes three independent publishers or imprints: Fitzcarraldo Editions, Serpent’s Tail and Granta. Penguin Random House has the biggest presence with five books across Chatto & Windus, Hamish Hamilton and Viking. Picador and John Murray each have two titles on the list, while 4th Estate rounds out the publishers represented.
The shortlist
The 2026 Booker Prize shortlist was announced on 22 September, with six novels making the final cut, including works by two previous winners, Marlon James and Douglas Stuart. While some readers are still calling for justice for Emma Cline’s Switzy which did not make the shortlist, attention has now turned to who might take home the prize. Elizabeth Strout, Douglas Stuart and Marlon James seem to be the obvious frontrunners, but there’s plenty of room for a surprise. May We Feed the King has been much loved by readers, The End of Everything seems to have confused many readers about why it made the list, and Black Bag has received mixed reviews. As for us, we’re hopeful this will finally be Strout’s year.
Chair of the judging panel Mary Beard praised the selection for showcasing the strengths of contemporary fiction, describing novels that range “from the hilarious to the discomfiting, from the frighteningly strange to the alarmingly domestic, from the powerfully shocking to the intriguingly understated.”
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