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Six books have been named finalists for the 2026 International Booker Prize. Formerly known as the Man Booker International Prize, this honor is presented annually for a work of fiction that was originally written in a language other than English, then translated into English and published in the U.K. and/or Ireland.
In a moment in which international relations are dominating news headlines around the globe, three of these shortlisted novels explore pivotal moments in world history: imperialist Japan-controlled Taiwan in the 1930s, Nazi-era Germany and the 1979 Revolution in Iran.
“With narratives that capture moments from across the past century, these books reverberate with history,” author Natasha Brown, chair of this year’s International Booker Prize jury, said in a statement. “While there’s heartbreak, brutality, and isolation among these stories, their lasting effect is energising. Rereading each book, we judges found hope, insight and burning humanity – along with unforgettable characters to whom I’m sure readers will return again and again.”
This year’s shortlist particularly celebrates female authors and translators: Five of the authors and four of the translators are women. As well as hailing from four continents, the shortlisted authors and translators come from remarkably diverse professional backgrounds: Taiwan’s Yáng Shuāng-zǐ writes manga and video game scripts, and Bulgaria’s Rene Karabash is a well-established actor as well as author.
The winning author and translator will be announced on May 19. They will split a prize of £50,000 (about $66,000).
The finalists are:
The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran by Shida Bazyar, translated from German by Ruth Martin
This is a multigenerational tale told by four different family members – first during the Iranian Revolution of 1979, then as the family seeks a new home in West Germany – that takes readers back to Iran, and the Iranian people’s struggle to come to a new political and social reality during the Green Revolution of 2009. In Australia’s The Saturday Paper, Rhoda Kwan wrote that The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran is “a quietly beautiful exploration of the trauma of losing one’s homeland to a savage regime, the novel is testament to how hope and the revolutionary spirit endure in the face of crushing tyranny, how courage cannot be fully stamped out.”
She Who Remains by Rene Karabash, translated from Bulgarian by Izidora Angel
An independent-minded young woman named Bekja, living in Albania’s rural Accursed Mountains, escapes an arranged marriage, reshapes her life and decides to live as a man. That declaration sets off a chain reaction in the community, ultimately separating Bekja from the person she loves the most. The International Booker Prize judges called She Who Remains “an exquisitely written, brilliantly observed story about a young woman in a contemporary Albanian tribal society, and a blood feud that sets off her journey to self-discovery.”
The Director by Daniel Kehlmann, translated from German by Ross Benjamin
This novel is the fictionalized story of real-life Austrian film maker G.W. Pabst, who fled a prominent career in Nazi Germany to make a new life in Hollywood. Due to his ailing mother, however, he returns to his native country, where the regime begins pressuring him to make propaganda. In The New Yorker, critic David Denby called The Director a “complex entertainment—a sorrowful fable of artistic and moral collapse, but also a novel composed with entrancing freedom, even bravura.”
On Earth As It Is Beneath by Ana Paula Maia, translated from Portuguese by Padma Viswanathan
This is a horror novella set in a remote penal colony in which every full moon, the warden releases the inmates into the wilderness – only to hunt them down. In The New York Times, critic Gabino Iglesias enthused that On Earth As It Is Beneath is “a must read for those who like their poetry written in blood.”
The Witch by Marie NDiaye, translated from French by Jordan Stump
This novel is the oldest of this year’s crop of shortlisted nominees: It was originally published in French in 1996. Its protagonist is Lucie, a not terribly gifted witch, who passes on her familial powers to her own daughters, Maud and Lise. Vulture critic Jasmine Vojdani wrote of The Witch: “This is NDiaye at her disquieting best.”
Taiwan Travelogue by Yáng Shuāng-zǐ, translated from Mandarin Chinese by Lin King
This novel, which already won the 2024 National Book Award for translated literature, traces a year-long journey through Taiwan by a (fictional) young Japanese novelist, Aoyama Chizuko, a young writer of voracious appetites. Chizuko has been invited to Taiwan by the Japanese government, which currently controls the island; once there, she meets her Taiwanese interpreter, Chizuru, who enraptures Chizuko. New York Times reviewer Shahnaz Habib wrote that Taiwan Travelogue is “a delightfully slippery novel about how power shapes relationships, and what travel reveals and conceals.”
The judges for the 2026 International Booker prize are author Natasha Brown; writer, broadcaster and professor Marcus du Sautoy; translator Sophie Hughes; writer, editor and bookseller Troy Onyango; and novelist and columnist Nilanjana S. Roy.
