Booker Prize 2026 longlist: Former winners Marlon James and Douglas Stuart lead 13-book selection

Keeping tradition 13 books have been longlisted for The Booker Prize. © Yuki Sugiura for Booker Prize Foundation. The highly anticipated Booker Prize 2026 longlist was announced on Tuesday. The list, which comprises 13 books, includes two former winners— Marlon James and Douglas Stuart—three-time nominee Elizabeth Strout, and 10 first-time nominees, of which three are debut novelists. Celebrated classicist and broadcaster Mary Beard chaired this year’s judging panel, which included the poet Raymond Antrobus, musician Jarvis Cocker, journalist Rebecca Liu, and Booker-shortlisted novelist Patricia Lockwood. The panel selected the longlist from 163 submissions, all works of long-form fiction written in English and published in the UK or Ireland between 1 October 2025 and 30 September 2026. Booker Prize 2026 Longlist: Meet the Books Tap a title to read its synopsis Shadow of the Object Switzy Helen of Nowhere End of Everything The Disappearers Black Bag The Renovation May We Feed the King The Palm House John of John All Them Dogs The Vivisectors The Shadow of the Object Chloe Aridjis A woman recovering from a dog bite in a Mexico City hospital strikes up a spellbinding friendship with an elderly collector of pre-cinema toys, then returns to London where the line between imagination and reality starts to blur. Judges called it a meditation on desire, metamorphosis and mortality. Switzy Emma Cline A retired American executive with dementia travels across Europe toward an assisted-death clinic in Zurich, his fading memories surfacing as an assistant shepherds him through a final, fractured pilgrimage. Praised as a hypnotic, darkly humorous portrait of a life unravelling. Helen of Nowhere Makenna Goodman A disgraced professor tours a countryside home with a realtor, who tells him about Helen, the house's enigmatic former owner — and what he might have to give up to live as simply as she did. Judges called it philosophically and spiritually adventurous. The End of Everything M. John Harrison In a post-apocalyptic Britain where the seas hold strange new creatures, a beachcomber salvages a shape-shifting object he can't keep — one that threatens to undo everything he thinks he understands. Described by judges as shimmering, oblique, and about "now." The Disappearers Marlon James Eight gay men rehearsing what's billed as Jamaica's first openly gay play are attacked by a mob in 1980s Kingston; years later, a survivor sets out to trace what became of the others. James previously won the Booker Prize in 2015. Black Bag Luke Kennard A broke actor takes a bizarre job sitting zipped inside a bag through university psychology lectures, setting off a satire on masculinity, online life and unlikely love. Judges praised its sharply crafted sentences and humour. The Renovation Kenan Orhan A Turkish exile hires builders to renovate her bathroom for her ailing father — and finds they've installed a fully functioning Turkish prison cell instead, pulling her back toward the homeland she left behind. Judges called it a hilarious fantasy with an unsettling side. May We Feed the King Rebecca Perry A museum curator who stages historic banquets becomes absorbed in the story of an almost-forgotten, reluctant medieval king facing whispers that he's unfit to rule. Judges called it a delicate meditation on history and storytelling. The Palm House Gwendoline Riley Two old friends navigate a hostile magazine takeover, a lost father and a precarious London life, in a wry, closely observed study of long friendship. Judges praised its minimalist, precise dialogue. John of John Douglas Stuart An art-school dropout returns to the Isle of Harris, caught between his devout sheep-farmer father and his Glaswegian grandmother, as an insular community's fragile peace comes undone. Stuart previously won the Booker Prize in 2020 for Shuggie Bain. All Them Dogs Djamel White Back in West Dublin's gangland after years away,