Wales makes its mark on longlist for prestigious literary prize

Gosia Buzzanca

Wales is strongly represented on the newly announced longlist for the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, with four acclaimed titles recognised among this year’s selection.

The longlist highlights work spanning memoir, cultural criticism, history and biography. It celebrates bold, original voices whose writing explores identity, creativity, survival and belonging, both personal and collective.

This year’s longlist for the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction includes three writers with Welsh connections: Jenny Evans for Don’t Let It Break You, Honey: A Memoir About Saving Yourself, Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason for To Be Young, Gifted and Black: Creativity and Race in the 21st Century, and Zakia Sewell for Finding Albion: Myth, Folklore and the Quest for a Hidden Britain.

A fourth title – Artists, Siblings, Visionaries by Judith Mackrell – details the lives of Welsh artists and siblings Gwen and Augustus John.

The Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, sponsored by Findmypast, celebrates excellent, original and accessible narrative non-fiction written by female thought-leaders, changemakers and experts.

Jenny Evans grew up in Abergavenny and is a journalist and survivor whose memoir Don’t Let It Break You, Honey chronicles her experiences of assault, public exposure, and systemic injustice, offering a raw, empowering story of survival and self-reclamation.

Zakia Sewell is a writer, DJ and broadcaster, who spent much of her childhood in her father’s hometown of Laugharne. Praised by authors, musicians, artists, historians, academics and more, Finding Albion is Sewell’s search for an alternative spirit of Britain, one that presents an inclusive and progressive future while confronting the legacy of empire and the complexity of Britain’s history.

From multi-award winning author, music-lover, and mother Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason, who grew up in Caldicot, To Be Young, Gifted and Black details conversations with the extraordinarily gifted Kanneh-Mason family to explore the experience of coming of age as a Black artist in these turbulent times and offer a message of hope, power, and resilience.

Acclaimed biographer Judith Mackrell’ Artists, Siblings, Visionaries brings new depth to Pembrokeshire-born artists and siblings Gwen and Augustus John, exploring these two prodigiously talented visionaries, whose experiments with form and colour created some of the most memorable work of the early twentieth century.

These are four of sixteen longlisted books that reflect the vital work of the Women’s Prize Trust and their belief that every woman’s voice has the power to elicit and inspire change. The longlist spans politics, memoir, science, history, biography, art, and more, in an extraordinary, international celebration of women’s writing.

Thangam Debbonaire, Chair of Judges, said: “When I was invited to Chair the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction I said ‘yes’ without hesitation, because this Prize is a powerful, trusted and necessary platform for women’s voices and experience.

“Today, alongside my fellow judges, I am proud to reveal a compelling longlist that shows remarkable breadth and depth – women writing excellently on a wide range of subjects, each uncovering something new about our world.

“The books on this hopeful longlist are rigorous and researched, lyrical and flowing. They are drawn together by the originality and skill with which they have been written.

“This reading list carries relevance and truth for the future as well as holding significant value for the present day – the books spark curiosity and demand attention; they are for everyone navigating the complicated and unpredictable world we are living in.

“The voices of these sixteen remarkable women need to be heard – loud and clear.”

The longlist for the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction is:

Daughters of the Bamboo Grove: China’s Stolen Children and a Story of Separated Twins by Barbara Demick (Granta)

The Finest Hotel in Kabul: A People’s History of Afghanistan by Lyse Doucet (Hutchinson Heinemann, Cornerstone, Penguin Random House UK)

Don’t Let It Break You, Honey: A Memoir About Saving Yourself by Jenny Evans (Robinson, Little, Brown Book Group, Hachette UK)

Art Cure: The Science of How the Arts Transform Our Health by Daisy Fancourt (Cornerstone Press, Cornerstone, Penguin Random House UK)

With the Law on Our Side: How the Law Works for Everyone and How We Can Make It Work Better by Lady Hale (The Bodley Head, Vintage, Penguin Random House UK)

To Be Young, Gifted and Black: Creativity and Race in the 21st Century by Kadiatu Kanneh-Mason (Oneworld, Oneworld Publications)

Artists, Siblings, Visionaries: The Lives and Loves of Gwen and Augustus John by Judith Mackrell (Picador, Pan Macmillan)

Ask Me How It Works: Love in an Open Marriage by Deepa Paul (Viking, Penguin General, Penguin Random House UK)

Death of an Ordinary Man by Sarah Perry (Jonathan Cape, Vintage, Penguin Random House UK)

The Genius of Trees: How Trees Mastered the Elements and Shaped the World by Harriet Rix (The Bodley Head, Vintage, Penguin Random House UK)

Hotel Exile: Paris in the Shadow of War by Jane Rogoyska (Allen Lane, Penguin Press, Penguin Random House UK)

Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy (Hamish Hamilton, Penguin General, Penguin Random House UK)

Finding Albion: Myth, Folklore and the Quest for a Hidden Britain by Zakia Sewell (Hodder Press, Hodder & Stoughton, Hachette UK)

To Exist As I Am: A Doctor’s Notes on Recovery and Radical Acceptance by Grace Spence Green (Wellcome Collection, Profile Books)

Nation of Strangers: Rebuilding Home in the 21st Century by Ece Temelkuran (Canongate)

Indignity: A Life Reimagined by Lea Ypi (Allen Lane, Penguin Press, Penguin Random House UK)

The judges will now narrow down the longlist to a shortlist of six, which will be announced on 25 March 2026. The winner of the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction will be revealed on Thursday 11 June 2026 at the Women’s Prize Trust’s summer party in Bedford Square Gardens, London (along with the winner of its sister prize, the 2026 Women’s Prize for Fiction).

The winner of the 2026 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, sponsored by Findmypast, will receive £30,000 and a limited-edition artwork known as the ‘Charlotte’ sculpted by Ann Christopher RA FRSS, and both gifted by the Charlotte Aitken Trust. Previous winners include Dr Rachel Clarke (The Story of a Heart, 2025) and Naomi Klein (Doppelganger, 2024).

More information about the charitable mission of the Women’s Prize Trust can be found here.