These six books are now on the 2026 Women’s Prize for Fiction shortlist

Women continue to crush it in literature, and this year is no different.

On Wednesday, six authors were named on the Women’s Prize Trust 2026 Women’s Prize for Fiction shortlist, which means they’ve written books that examine the female experience in a groundbreaking way.

The short list narrows down titles from 16 to six and in June, the trust will announce one winner who will win £30,000 (about $40K in USD) and the trust’s "Bessie" statuette. But already, we have a list of worthwhile books that an experienced panel of judges believes deserve recognition. (Judges this year include Julia Gillard, the former Prime Minister of Australia; poet, novelist and essayist, Mona Arshi; author, presenter, poet and speaker, Salma El-Wardany; writer, podcaster, actor and comedian, Cariad Lloyd and author, broadcaster and DJ, Annie Macmanus.)

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According to the trust, the books span genre and setting, from the 1960s to the present day, from the Mississippi Delta to Japan, and from a college campus to the family home. But they all explore the complexity and beauty of the female experience as well as "the wealth of roles women play in society, the power they hold, and the extent to which they choose, or are able, to wield it."

"The significance and experience of fiction is highly subjective and personal, but we can share in its undeniable power to hold up a lens to the realities of our world, and to connect with ourselves and each other," said Claire Shanahan, the executive director of the Women’s Prize Trust. "As we come together as a nation in the National Year of Reading to consider the joy of reading, we’re proud at the Women’s Prize Trust to present this delicious shortlist of excellent, original and accessible novels to readers around the world, to delve into, to enjoy and discuss."

You can watch the announcement below:

Now, in no particular order, are the six shortlisted books up for the Women’s Prize for Fiction and their summaries per the trust:

1. Rozie Kelly, author of Kingfisher

"When a creative writing academic becomes infatuated with his colleague—the poet—it is not long before it begins to threaten his relationship with his partner, Michael. Michael is beautiful. Michael is safe. But the poet is everything he isn't; she has everything he wants. While he writes about steel and sex, she dreams about the movements of swallows. While he tends to his budding career, she writes from her big, white house in the woods. As he slips between his old life and this new one, his fixation grows into something more powerful. The poet, his Kingfisher, is his sole focus. He is hypnotized. But when simultaneous illnesses threaten to destroy the precarious reality he clings to, he's forced to question what he can and cannot take from someone. This is a novel about grief, power and desire—and the tangles in between that make up a life."

2. Lily King, author of Heart the Lover

"Our narrator understands good love stories—their secrets, their highs and free falls. But her greatest love story, the one she lived, never followed the rules. She was in her senior year of college when star students Sam and Yash swept her into an intoxicating world of academic fervor, rapid-fire banter and raucous card games. Their lives become quickly intertwined—with friendship but also with unpredictable passions and the intimations of first love. Decades later, she is a successful writer, living a comfortable life with her husband and children, when a surprise visit brings the past crashing into the present, forcing her to confront the decisions and deceptions of her youth."

Heart the Lover has had one of the longest waitlists at NYC libraries, alongside The Correspondent by Virginia Evans.

3. Susan Choi, author of Flashlight

"One evening, 10-year-old Louisa and her father take a walk out on the breakwater. They are spending the summer in a coastal Japanese town while her father Serk, a Korean émigré, completes an academic secondment from his American university. When Louisa wakes hours later, she has washed up on the beach and her father is missing, probably drowned. The disappearance of Louisa’s father shatters their small family unit. As Louisa and her American mother Anne return to the U.S., this traumatic event reverberates across time and space, and the mystery of what really happened to Serk slowly unravels."

4. Addie E. Citchens, author of Dominion

"In the town of Dominion, Mississippi, Reverend Sabre Winfrey is more than a preacher. From his pulpit at the Seven Seals Baptist Church to the airwaves of his local radio station, he exerts influence over every aspect of society. By his side is his wife Priscilla, who types up his sermons and raises their five sons, favoring the youngest, Wonderboy. Handsome and adored, Wonderboy is destined to carry on his father’s legacy. But after a violent altercation with a stranger, Wonderboy's actions send shockwaves through the community. Told through the perspectives of the women who love these two men, this Morrisonian, God-troubled novel illuminates the pervasive sins of the patriarchy, and the bargains women strike to survive them."

5. Virginia Evans, author of The Correspondent

"Every morning, Sybil Van Antwerp sits down to write letters—to her brother, to her best friend, to the president of the university who will not allow her to attend a class she desperately wants to take, to her favorite authors to tell them what she thinks of their latest books, and to one person to whom she writes often yet never sends the letter. Because at 73, Sybil has used her correspondence—witty and wise—to make sense of the world. But beyond the page, she has spent the last 30 years keeping the people who love her at arm’s length … until letters from someone in her past force her to examine one of the most painful periods of her life. Now, Sybil must send the letter she has been writing for all these years—and find forgiveness within herself in order to move on."

The Correspondent has had one of the longest waitlists at NYC libraries, alongside Heart the Lover by Lily King.

6. Marcia Hutchinson, author of The Mercy Step

"A precocious Mercy makes her reluctant entrance into the world, torn from the warm embrace of her mother's womb, to a chaotic household that seems to have no place for her. Her siblings do not understand her, her mother’s attention is given to the Church, and the entire family lives at the whims of her father's quick temper. Left to herself, Mercy finds solace in books, her imagination, and the quiet comfort of her faithful toy, Dolly. But escapism has its limits, and as the grip of family, faith and fear threatens to close in, Mercy learns she must act if she wants a different future; one where she is seen, heard, and her family set free."

You can listen to an audiobook sample and see where to purchase a physical copy at each book’s link above.

Stay tuned–the 2026 Women’s Prize for Fiction will be revealed on June 11.