Another big book award lineup was announced at the end of February, and I am a little behind on mentioning it, but the Booker Prize for 2026 has an outstanding longlist of thirteen books. The main criteria for these books are that they are “long-form fiction or collections of short stories translated into English and published in the UK and/or Ireland between 1 May 2025 and 30 April 2026”, but that does not mean that the original text written in a native language was published in the last year. I am blown away by the scope of literature this year’s nominees feature, and the astounding stories and voices within. Without further ado, let’s see what the longlist titles are.

Taiwan Travelogue by Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, translated by Lin King, originally published in Mandarin Chinese in 2020

A bittersweet story of love between two women, nested in an artful exploration of language, history and power. May 1938. The young novelist Aoyama Chizuko has sailed from her home in Nagasaki, Japan, and arrived in Taiwan. She’s been invited there by the Japanese government ruling the island, though she has no interest in their official banquets or imperialist agenda. Instead, Chizuko longs to experience real island life and to taste as much of its authentic cuisine as her famously monstrous appetite can bear. Soon, a Taiwanese woman – who is younger even than she is, and who shares the characters of her name – is hired as her interpreter and makes her dreams come true. The charming, erudite, meticulous Chizuru arranges Chizuko’s travels all over the Land of the South and also proves to be an exceptional cook. Over scenic train rides and braised pork rice, lively banter and winter melon tea, Chizuko grows infatuated with her companion and intent on drawing her closer. But something causes Chizuru to keep her distance. It’s only after a heartbreaking separation that Chizuko begins to grasp what the ‘something’ is.

The Wax Child by Ogla Ravn, translated by Martin Aitken, originally published in Danish in 2023

A chilling story about female power and brutality, nature and magic, and a dizzying insight into a 17th-century worldview. It was a black night in the year 1620 when Christenze Krukow made the wax child, melting down beeswax and setting it in the image of a small human. For days, she carried it tucked beneath her arm, shaping it with the warmth of her flesh, giving it life. She fashioned eyes and ears for it that cannot open, and yet it watches and listens. The wax child looks on as Christenze is haunted by rumour, it hears what the people whisper. It sees how, in the candlelight, she gazes with love at her friends, and hears the things they say in the shadows. It knows pine forest, misty fjord and the crackle of the burning pyre. It observes the violence in men’s eyes and the cruelty of their laws. In time, it begins to understand that once a suspicion of witchcraft has taken hold, it can prove impossible to shake.

Women Without Men by Shahrnush Parsipur, translated by Faridoun Farrokh, originally published in Persian in 1989

An internationally acclaimed novel that traces the interwoven destinies of five women – including a wealthy middle-aged housewife, a sex worker and a schoolteacher – as they arrive by different paths to live together in an abundant garden on the outskirts of Tehran.  Drawing on elements of Islamic mysticism and recent Iranian history, the novel depicts women escaping the narrow confines of family and society, and imagines their future living in a world without men.

The Witch by Maria NDiaye, translated by Jordan Stump, originally published in French in 1996

Lucie comes from a long line of witches, powers passed down from mother to daughter. Her own mother was formidable in her powers, but ashamed of her magic. Perhaps as a result, Lucie’s own gift is weak: she can see into the future, sometimes, but more often she can only see the present of some other location. Not very useful. And the worst part? All she can ever see are insignificant details – a scrap of outfit, the colour of the sky. Lucie’s own children are initiated into their family’s peculiar womanhood when they reach 12 years of age, and in a few short months, Maud and Lise are crying the curious tears of blood that denote their magical powers. Having learned, they take off quickly and fly the nest. Literally. Witty, dreamlike, unsettling and enchanting, The Witch brings the mysteries of womanhood and motherhood into sharp relief and leaves us teetering on the edge, unbalanced by questions as seemingly unbreakable relationships break down left and right. Who is to blame for family failures? And how can you build a nest that no one wants to fly?

The Duke by Matteo Malchiorre, translated by Antonella Lettieri, originally published in Italian in 2022

Outside Vallorgàna, a tiny, isolated village high in the foothills of the Dolomites, the ‘Duke’ lives in the villa of his aristocratic ancestors. The last of the Cimamonte family, he spends his days on his land and absorbed in his archive, tolerated, if gently ridiculed by his neighbours. When the Duke finds out that the village big man is taking timber from his land, he has a decision to make. Will he stay in his glorious isolation, or will he honour his ancestral blood and take action against this affront? Matteo Melchiorre creates a sweeping portrait of the idiosyncratic character of the Duke and the world of Vallorgàna. With the pace, panorama and plot twists of a 19th-century classic, the breathless story of the Duke’s ensuing feud unfolds, asking 21st-century questions about our relationships with privilege, the past, the natural world and each other.

On Earth As Is Beneath by Ana Paula Maia, translated by Pada Viswanathan, originally published in Portuguese in 2017

On land where enslaved people were once tortured and murdered, the state built a penal colony in the wilderness, where inmates could be rehabilitated, but never escape. Now, decades later, and having only succeeded in trapping men, not changing them for the better, its operations are winding down. But in the prison’s waning days, a new horror is unleashed: every full-moon night, the inmates are released, the warden is armed with rifles, and the hunt begins. Every man plans his escape, not knowing if his end will come at the hands of a familiar face, or from the unknown dangers beyond the prison walls. Ana Paula Maia delivers a bracing vision of our potential for violence, and our collective failure to account for the consequences of our social and political action, or inaction. No crime is committed out of view for this novelist, and her raw, brutal power enlists us all as witnesses.

The Director by Daniel Kehlmann, translated by Ross Benjamin, originally published in German in 2023

An artist’s life and a pact with the devil: this is a novel about the dangerous illusions of the silver screen. When the Nazis seize power in the 1930s, G.W. Pabst, one of cinema’s greatest directors, is filming in France. To escape the horrors of the new Germany, he flees to Hollywood. But under the dazzling California sun, the world-famous director suddenly looks like a nobody. Not even Greta Garbo, whom he made famous, can help him.   When Pabst receives word that his elderly mother is ailing, he finds himself back in his homeland of Austria, which is now called Ostmark. Pabst, his wife and his young son are confronted with the barbaric nature of the regime, but the minister of propaganda in Berlin wants the film genius. He won’t take no for an answer, and he makes big promises.   While Pabst still believes that he will be able to resist these advances, that he will not submit to any dictatorship other than art, he has already taken the first steps into a hopeless entanglement. 

She Who Remains by Rene Karabash, translated by Izidora Angel, originally published in Bulgarian in 2018

A dark and poetic novel about identity, gender, love, freedom, and societal norms. High in Albania’s Accursed Mountains, in a village ruled by the ancient laws of the Kanun, Bekja escapes an arranged marriage by becoming a sworn virgin, renouncing her womanhood to live as a man. Her decision sets off a brutal chain of events, destroying her family and separating her from the one she loves the most. Years later, as Bekija – now Matija – tells their story to a visiting journalist, long-buried truths come to light, along with the realisation of all that might have been.

Small Comfort by Ia Genberg, translated by Kira Josefsson, originally published in Swedish in 2018

Intricately built and wickedly humorous, these five interconnected short stories are all about one thing: money. From an interview with a child-star-turned-thief to the mysterious death of an employee at a drug manufacturer – or the couple feigning marital bliss to keep their inheritance, Ia Genberg carefully unravels the value we place on both money and people. What does it really mean to be in debt to someone? How does our financial worth permeate the ways we think and feel? And what do we lose when we supposedly win?

The Deserters by Mathias Énard, translated by Charlotte Mandell, originally published in French in 2023

A mesmerising and inventive novel that lays bare the devastations of war on the most intimate aspects of our lives. Fleeing a nameless war, a soldier emerges from the Mediterranean scrubland, filthy, exhausted and seeking refuge. A chance meeting forces him to rethink his journey, and the price he puts on a life. On 11 September 2001, aboard a small cruise ship near Berlin, a scientific conference pays tribute to the late Paul Heudeber, an East German mathematician, Buchenwald survivor, communist and anti-fascist whose commitment to his side of the Wall was unshaken by its collapse. The oblique pull between these two narratives – a cipher in itself – brings to light everything that is at stake in times of conflict: truth and deception, loyalty and betrayal, hope and despair.

The Remembered Soldier by Anjet Daanje, translated by David McKay, originally published in Dutch in 2019

Set in the aftermath of the First World War, this is an extraordinary love story about the power of memory and imagination. Flanders 1922. After serving as a soldier in the Great War, Noon Merckem has lost his memory and lives in a psychiatric asylum. Countless women, responding to a newspaper ad, visit him there in the hope of finding their spouse who vanished in battle. One day, a woman, Julienne, appears and recognises Noon as her husband, the photographer Amand Coppens, and takes him home against medical advice. Their miraculous reunion doesn’t turn out the way that Julienne wants her envious friends to believe. Only gradually do the two grow close, and Amand’s biography is pieced together on the basis of Julienne’s stories about him. But how can Amand be certain that Julienne is telling the truth? When he comes to doubt her word, the reader is caught up in a riveting spiral of confusion. 

We Are Green and Trembling by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara, translated by Robin Myers, originally published in Spanish in 2023

A queer, baroque, tender and surreal novel that conveys glimmers of hope for the future within the brutal colonial history of Latin America. From deep in the wilds of the New World, Antonio writes a letter to his aunt, the prioress of the same Basque convent he escaped as a young girl. Since transforming into Antonio, he has had monumental adventures and taken on numerous guises. He has been a mule driver, shopkeeper, soldier, cabin boy and conquistador. He has wielded his sword and slashed with his dagger. Now, hiding in the jungle and hounded by the army he deserted, Antonio is looking after two Guaraní girls he rescued from enslavement. But the New World has one more metamorphosis in store, which might save them all from extinction.  

The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran by Shida Bazyar, translated by Ruth Martin, originally published in German in 2016

Set across four decades, from 1979 to 2009, this is a polyphonic novel of one family’s flight from and return to Iran. 1979. Behsad, a young communist revolutionary, fights with his friends for a new order after the Shah’s expulsion. He tells of sparking hope, of clandestine political actions, and of how he finds the love of his life in the courageous, intelligent Nahid. 1989. Nahid lives her new life in West Germany with Behsad. With their young children, they spend hour after hour in front of the radio, hoping for news from others who went into hiding after the mullahs came to power. 1999. Laleh returns to Iran with her mother, Nahid. Between beauty rituals and family secrets, she gets to know a Tehran that hardly matches her childhood memories. 2009. Laleh’s brother Mo is more concerned with a friend’s heartbreak than with student demonstrations in Germany. But then the Green Revolution breaks out in Iran and turns the world upside down.