This year's Booker shortlist is made up of tales spanning a wide range of genres, from historical fiction to campus novel to dystopian fiction.
Past Booker Prize winners Marlon James and Douglas Stuart find themselves on the shortlist again with their latest works, The Disappearers and John of John, respectively. And Elizabeth Strout is also back as a finalist for the prize again, this time for The Things We Never Say.
"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," Mary Beard, chair of the 2025 judging panel, said in a statement. "This is writing at its best."
The six shortlisted authors receive a special bound copy of their book and a £2,500 prize (about $3,300). The winner, announced on Nov. 9, is awarded a trophy and £50,000 (about $66,600).
This year's Booker shortlisters are:
The End of Everything by M. John Harrison
Known for his science fiction, Harrison has written 13 novels and a number of short story collections. In The End of Everything, he creates a post-apocalyptic world where the main character collects and sells treasures washed up on the shores of the English Channel – until he comes across something unusual.
The Disappearers by Marlon James
James won the Booker Prize in 2015 for A Brief History of Seven Killings. The Disappearers, his fifth book, is also longlisted for the National Book Award this year. It's about a hateful mob attack on a group of gay men putting on a play in Kingston, Jamaica, in 1988, when homophobia was rampant. James told NPR in an interview, "this attack in the book was based on an incident which I knew in my gut happened. I just couldn't prove it."
Black Bag by Luke Kennard
Kennard is a poet and the author of three novels. The narrator of Kennard's book finds himself hidden in the titular black bag in the back of a professor's classroom. The novel is based on an actual experiment from 1967. In an interview with NPR, Kennard explained that a professor is testing the "mere-exposure effect" – "the idea that we become fond of things just by encountering them over and over again even if we dislike them at first."
May We Feed the King by Rebecca Perry
Perry, a poet, makes the list with her debut novel. The book looks at the story of a reluctant king and how his life is remembered, through the eyes of a curator. The Guardian called it "an ingenious novel that asks how much we can really know about history."
The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout
Strout was shortlisted in 2022 for her book Oh William! and she was longlisted in 2016 for My Name is Lucy Barton. Of her latest work, NPR critic Maureen Corrigan said: "Talk about enchantment. Every time Elizabeth Strout brings out a new novel — which is often — I think to myself: She can't pull off another great book again. And then she does."
John of John by Douglas Stuart
Stuart won the prize in 2020 for his debut novel Shuggie Bain. John of John, his third novel, is about a father and son who share the same secret - and how religion and obligation and place play into their lives. Stuart told Fresh Air, "I mean, I think my whole childhood was about secrets on all sorts of levels."
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