2025 Booker Prize Shortlist Spotlight: Top Novels and Authors
This year’s shortlist for the Booker Prize showcases an impressive array of genres, including historical fiction, campus novels, and dystopian tales. Former Booker Prize winners Marlon James and Douglas Stuart shine again with their latest works, The Disappearers and John of John, respectively. Elizabeth Strout also returns as a finalist, presenting her new novel The Things We Never Say.
Mary Beard, chair of the 2025 judging panel, praised the selection: “These novels range from the hilarious to the discomfiting, from the frighteningly strange to the alarmingly domestic, from the powerfully shocking to the intriguingly understated. This is writing at its best.”
Each of the six shortlisted authors receives a special bound copy of their book and a £2,500 prize, equating to approximately $3,300. The winner, set to be announced on November 9, will receive a trophy along with a £50,000 prize, roughly $66,600.
This year’s shortlisted novels include:
- The End of Everything by M. John Harrison: Known for his science fiction, Harrison has crafted 13 novels along with numerous short story collections. The End of Everything introduces a post-apocalyptic world where the protagonist trades treasures found along the English Channel shore, leading to an extraordinary discovery.
- The Disappearers by Marlon James: Winner of the Booker Prize in 2015 for A Brief History of Seven Killings, this is James’ fifth book. It’s also nominated for the National Book Award this year. The book centers on a mob attack on gay men staging a play in Kingston, Jamaica, during 1988, a period marked by rampant homophobia.
- Black Bag by Luke Kennard: A poet and author of three novels, Kennard’s work features a narrator concealed within a black bag in a professor’s classroom. The novel draws inspiration from a 1967 experiment, exploring the “mere-exposure effect,” the idea that repeated encounters can create fondness, even if initial feelings are negative.
- May We Feed the King by Rebecca Perry: Marking Perry’s debut into novel writing, her narrative follows a reluctant king’s legacy through the perspective of a curator. The Guardian praised it as “an ingenious novel that asks how much we can really know about history.”
- The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout: Previously shortlisted in 2022 for Oh William! and longlisted in 2016 for My Name is Lucy Barton, Strout continues to impress. NPR critic Maureen Corrigan expressed admiration: “Every time Elizabeth Strout releases a novel, I doubt it can be as great as the last. Yet she consistently delivers.”
- John of John by Douglas Stuart: Stuart, who won the Booker in 2020 for Shuggie Bain, returns with his third novel. This story unravels the relationship between father and son, intertwined with mutual secrets and influenced by religion, obligation, and place. Stuart shared, “I think secrets defined my childhood at many levels.”