The winner of the Booker Prize 2026 has been revealed, with English author M. John Harrison becoming the first sci-fi author to win the prestigious literary award.
Also the oldest winner to date, the 81-year-old took home the £50,000 cash prize for his post-apocalyptic novel The End of Everything. Set on the coast of Kent in the years after a mysterious crisis caused the collapse of society in Britain.
Harrison was shortlisted alongside past winners Scottish author Douglas Stuart and Jamaican writer Marlon James, as well as nominees including Rebecca Perry, Elizabeth Strout, and Luke Kennard.
Since 2000, there have been 26 Booker Prize-winning authors - including Hilary Mantel and Margaret Atwood, both of whom have won the award twice.
With M. John Harrison the latest writer to receive the award, here are the 28 books which won the Booker Prize from 2000 to 2026.
9. 2019 — Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
English author Bernardine Evaristo was the joint Booker Prize 2010 winner for Girl, Woman, Other. “Grace is a Victorian orphan dreaming of the mysterious African father she will never meet. Winsome is a young Windrush bride, recently arrived from Barbados. Amma is the fierce queen of her 1980s squatters' palace. Morgan, who used to be Megan, is blowing up on social media, the newest activist-influencer on the block. Twelve very different people, mostly black and female, more than a hundred years of change, and one sweeping, vibrant, glorious portrait of contemporary Britain. Bernardine Evaristo presents a gloriously new kind of history for this old country: ever-dynamic, ever-expanding and utterly irresistible.” | AFP via Getty Images
10. 2018 — Milkman by Anna Burns
Northern Irish author Anna Burns took home the 2018 Booker Prize for Milkman. “In this unnamed city, to be interesting is dangerous. Middle sister is busy attempting to keep her mother from discovering her maybe-boyfriend and to keep everyone in the dark about her encounter with Milkman. But when first brother-in-law sniffs out her struggle, and rumours start to swell, middle sister becomes ‘interesting’. The last thing she ever wanted to be.” | AFP via Getty Images
11. 2017 — Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
American writer George Saunders' experimental novel Lincoln in the Bardo won the 2017 Booker Prize. “The American Civil War rages while President Lincoln's beloved eleven-year-old son lies gravely ill. In a matter of days, Willie dies and is laid to rest in a Georgetown cemetery. Newspapers report that a grief-stricken Lincoln returns to the crypt several times alone to hold his boy's body. From this seed of historical truth, George Saunders spins an unforgettable story of familial love and loss that breaks free of realism, entering a thrilling, supernatural domain both hilarious and terrifying. Willie Lincoln finds himself trapped in a transitional realm - called, in Tibetan tradition, the bardo - and as ghosts mingle, squabble, gripe and commiserate, and stony tendrils creep towards the boy, a monumental struggle erupts over young Willie's soul.” | AFP via Getty Images
12. 2016 — The Sellout by Paul Beatty
American author Paul Beatty's novel The Sellout won the 2016 Booker Prize. “Born in Dickens on the southern outskirts of Los Angeles, the narrator of The Sellout spent his childhood as the subject in his father’s racially charged psychological studies. He is told that this work will lead to a memoir that will solve their financial woes. But when his father is killed in a drive-by shooting, he discovers there never was a memoir. All that’s left is a bill for a drive-thru funeral. What’s more, Dickens has literally been wiped off the map to save California from further embarrassment. Fuelled by despair, the narrator sets out to right this wrong with the most outrageous action conceivable: reinstating slavery and segregating the local high school. The results will take him from Dickens to the Supreme Court, in the trial of the century.” | Getty Images