It was a night of anticipation and literary celebration at London’s Royal Festival Hall on September 23, 2025, as the Booker Prizes unveiled their much-awaited shortlist for this year’s top fiction award. In a ceremony that drew writers, critics, and book lovers from around the world, the six novels chosen represent a powerful cross-section of talent, experience, and cultural backgrounds, reinforcing the Booker’s reputation as a truly global prize for English-language fiction.
This year’s shortlist, whittled down from a longlist of 13 and an initial pool of 153 books published between October 2024 and September 2025, features: Flashlight by Susan Choi, The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai, Audition by Katie Kitamura, The Rest of Our Lives by Ben Markovits, The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller, and Flesh by David Szalay. Each shortlisted author receives £2,500 and a specially bound edition of their book, while the ultimate winner will take home £50,000—plus the kind of sales boost and acclaim that can transform a writer’s career.
The judging panel, chaired by acclaimed Irish writer Roddy Doyle and including Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀, Chris Power, Kiley Reid, and actor Sarah Jessica Parker, faced what Parker described as “real agony” in narrowing the field. “There’s nothing casual about letting a book go,” she said, reflecting on the emotional toll of cutting favorites from contention. “I think we all had a couple of books that our heart was broken [to lose].” The panel used a traffic light system over eight months of reading—green, amber, and red—to help organize their thoughts, but the final decisions were anything but easy.
Perhaps the most headline-grabbing entry is Kiran Desai’s The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny. Desai, who previously won the Booker in 2006 for The Inheritance of Loss, returns after a nearly two-decade hiatus with an epic, 650-page tale exploring love, ambition, and belonging as two Indian writers navigate life in the United States. The judges called it “an intimate and expansive epic about two people finding a pathway to love and each other,” and noted its richness in “meditations about class, race and nationhood.” Should Desai win, she would join the rarefied ranks of double Booker winners—Margaret Atwood, Peter Carey, J.M. Coetzee, and Hilary Mantel among them.
Desai’s competition is formidable. Susan Choi’s Flashlight, her sixth novel, begins with a young girl’s traumatic beachside walk with her father, who is presumed drowned. The narrative leaps across generations and continents, blending family drama with geopolitical intrigue. The judges described it as “a family drama and geopolitical thriller about a fascinating episode from history,” and confessed, “This is one of those books that completely dominates your thoughts.”
Katie Kitamura’s Audition offers a tense, existential exploration of identity. Narrated by an actress who meets a man claiming to be her son, the novel blurs the boundaries between performance and reality. A film adaptation, produced by Barack and Michelle Obama’s company and starring Lucy Liu, is already in the works. The judges praised it as “a brilliantly tense, taut novel that sees an actress’s life turned inside out and leaves a lot open to interpretation,” adding, “Audition makes existential detectives of us all.”
Ben Markovits, a former professional basketball player, delivers his twelfth novel, The Rest of Our Lives, which follows a middle-aged man embarking on a road trip after dropping his daughter off at university. The judges highlighted its relatable narrator and praised it as “a road trip chronicle, a book about sickness, a basketball novel, a family saga, and a story about how we say goodbye.”
Andrew Miller, a previous Booker finalist, is shortlisted for The Land in Winter, set during the infamous British “Big Freeze” of 1962. The novel delves into the unraveling of two couples’ lives amidst a ferocious winter storm. The judges called it “a novel about how to live, and about the tensions within marriages, set against the most dramatic winter in living memory. It’s a joy to read, a nerve-shredding pleasure.”
David Szalay’s Flesh completes the list. The British-Hungarian writer, previously nominated for All That Man Is in 2016, crafts a coming-of-age story about a shy Hungarian boy who becomes a driver and security guard for London’s ultra-rich. The panel described it as “a novel about class ascension and a man who is remarkably detached from his desires, and a disquisition on the art of being alive. It is also an absolute page-turner.”
This year’s shortlist is notable for its international flavor and the veteran status of its authors. As Gaby Wood, Chief Executive of the Booker Prize Foundation, put it, “They are already much loved by readers and critics, writers of enormous commitment, curiosity and skill.” All but Desai have published at least five books, and the list is dominated by established names rather than debutants. The American presence—three nominees, with Desai long resident in New York—has reignited discussions about the prize’s global scope. Judge Chris Power observed, “The English language is a victim of its own success so we have just got to acknowledge that it’s a global language and this is a global prize.”
Sarah Jessica Parker, reflecting on her experience as a judge, said, “It’s a privilege to have early access to so many new novels… I can’t even describe adequately what it feels like to have an author’s book in your hand, sometimes a very highly regarded established author whose book is not out yet.” She emphasized the excitement and responsibility of the process, noting, “It’s the most exciting day of the year every single time you get to the traffic lights. It’s like, you can’t sleep the night before. It’s so exciting.”
The Booker Prize has a storied history of launching literary careers and spotlighting diverse voices. Founded in 1969, it has honored writers such as Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, Ian McEwan, and Hilary Mantel. While some have worried about American dominance since the eligibility rules changed in 2014, the prize continues to draw attention to remarkable fiction from around the world. As Parker remarked, “I would love all literary awards and competitions to alert readers to great books, no matter where they’re from.”
The 2025 Booker Prize winner will be announced at a ceremony in London on November 10. For the authors on this year’s shortlist, the next few weeks promise suspense—and, perhaps, the transformation of a lifetime.
