Dublin author's debut novel makes 2026 Booker Prize longlist
Irish author Djamel White has been named amongst the authors longlisted for the 2026 Booker Prize. Picture: © Yuki Sugiura for Booker Prize Foundation.
Irish author Djamel White has been longlisted for the Booker Prize for his debut novel
The writer from Dublin, who holds an MFA from University College Dublin and is the recipient of a Literature Bursary Award and an Agility Award from the Arts Council of Ireland, was named among those longlisted for the prestigious literary award.
The longlist, known as the ‘Booker Dozen’ – 13 books by novelists who “brilliantly muster the power of words to take the reader to new places, to see old places from new angles, to change minds” – was revealed on Tuesday.
Written by authors representing seven nationalities and three continents, the longlist transports readers from a hospital in Mexico City to the criminal badlands of West Dublin and from the barren hillsides of the Outer Hebrides to Kingston, Jamaica in the late 1980s.
The books, chosen by a judging panel led by classicist, writer and broadcaster Mary Beard, feature themes about memory, mortality, metamorphosis and murder, old lives and new worlds, the limits of human understanding and the lengths we go to in order to survive.
Beard was joined by award-winning poet, writer and educator Raymond Antrobus; musician, writer and broadcaster Jarvis Cocker; journalist, editor and critic Rebecca Liu; and Booker Prize-shortlisted novelist, poet and essayist Patricia Lockwood, who together chose the list of 13 books.
Appearing on that list is the debut novel from Djamel White, who depicts a bracingly unsentimental portrait of West Dublin gangland.
Set well off the beaten track of the city’s usual literary landmarks, charts the lives, loyalties and dealings of a semi-organised crime world. The novel’s real achievement lies in something quieter and more easily overlooked beneath the bullets and bone-breaking dramatics: a subtle, textured humanity woven among the violent hyper-masculine protagonists.
The judges acknowledged White’s ear for dialogue that is “both racy and real”, as well as his gift for atmospheric description “that feels at once inventive and classically grounded”.
The judges also noted White’s understanding that the vernacular of the street, handled with precision and care, can carry as much emotional and literary weight as any elevated register.
Speaking about the longlist, chair of the judges, Mary Beard, said: “Great books have never been written to a single formula. We are confident that our longlist of books has something for everyone.
"There’s the funny and the unsettling (and in some cases the funny and unsettling); there’s dystopian fantasy and domestic drama; there’s the gritty and the magically mysterious; there are some that will please and some that may shock.”
- The Shadow of the Object by Chloe Aridjis
- Switzy by Emma Cline
- Helen of Nowhere by Makenna Goodman
- The End of Everything by M. John Harrison
- The Disappearers by Marlon James
- Black Bag by Luke Kennard
- The Renovation by Kenan Orhan
- May We Feed the King by Rebecca Perry
- The Palm House by Gwendoline Riley
- The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout
- John of John by Douglas Stuart
- All Them Dogs by Djamel White
- The Vivisectors by Missouri Williams
