Two Latin American authors are among the 13 finalists for the 2026 International Booker Prize, the award’s organisers announced on Tuesday.
The British literary prize honours a work of fiction translated into English.
Argentina’s Gabriela Cabezón Cámara, 57, and Brazil’s Ana Paula Maia, 48, were selected for the initial longlist of 13 titles, which will be narrowed down to six on March 31.
Cabezón Cámara’s novel Las niñas del naranjel (“We Are Green and Trembling”), published in 2023, was translated into English by US translator Robin Myers.
The Argentine author won the 2025 National Book Award in the United States in the Translated Literature category for her novel, which puts her among the frontrunners to take the UK prize.
Based on the life of Antonio de Erauso, a real figure from the Spanish conquest, the novel offers a critique of religious tyranny and the mistreatment of women and Indigenous peoples.
“This fiercely imaginative reworking of colonial history gives voice to a 17th-century figure in the depths of the South American jungle. At once playful and devastating, tender and enraging,” the judging panel said in a statement on Tuesday.
Cabezón Cámara was also shortlisted for the 2020 International Booker Prize for Las aventuras de la China Iron (published in English as “The Adventures of China Iron”).
Maia was selected for her novel Assim na terra como embaixo da terra (published in English as “On Earth As It Is Beneath”), translated by the Canadian writer Padma Viswanathan.
Published in 2017, Assim na terra como embaixo da terra explores the lives of those working on the margins of Brazilian society.
“Set in a remote penal colony, this vivid and compelling novel unfolds in a landscape where punishment has replaced justice. A stark and unsettling exploration of power and corruption,” the prize jury noted on Tuesday.
The panel, which assessed a selection of 128 works submitted by publishers and published in the United Kingdom between May 1, 2025 and April 30, 2026, also included on its longlist authors from Germany, France (both with two representatives), the Netherlands, Sweden, Bulgaria, Italy, Iran, Denmark and Taiwan.
The winner of the prize will be announced on May 19 at a ceremony held at London’s Tate Modern. The award carries a £50,000 cash prize (approximately US$68,000), to be divided equally between the winning author and the translator.
Now marking its 10th anniversary, the International Booker Prize – awarded to a work translated into English – has yet to honour a winner writing in Spanish or Portuguese.
Last year’s prize was awarded to Indian writer Banu Mushtaq for Heart Lamp.
– TIMES/AFP
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