The Women’s Prize for Fiction 2026 has been awarded to American author Virginia Evans for The Correspondent (Penguin Michael Joseph), and the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction 2026 was awarded to The Finest Hotel in Kabul: A People’s History of Afghanistan (Hutchinson Heinemann) by Lyse Doucet, the BBC’s chief international correspondent. Each author wins £30,000.
Julia Gillard, former prime minister of Australia, was joined on the Women’s Prize for Fiction judging panel by poet, novelist and essayist, Mona Arshi; author, presenter, poet and speaker, Salma El-Wardany; writer, podcaster, actor and comedian, Cariad Lloyd; and author, broadcaster and DJ, Annie Macmanus.
Gillard said: “The Correspondent by Virginia Evans is a remarkable novel, with an exemplary combination of originality, excellence and accessibility. It is no mean feat to write a life in letters, but Evans makes this feel effortless, asking the reader to consider the choices we make, while elevating an ordinary life in the most heartfelt of ways. The sheer skill required to render an emotionally resonant and engaging work in this format is spectacular. This is a novel that captured our hearts, and should be read and savoured by all.”
On this year’s Non-fiction judging panel were Thangam Debbonaire, CEO of UK Opera Association, cultural strategist and politician; Roma Agrawal, engineer, author and broadcaster; Nicola Elliott, founder of NEOM Wellbeing; Nina Stibbe, novelist and memoirist, and Nicola Williams, Crown Court judge and thriller author.
Debbonaire said: “The Finest Hotel in Kabul by Lyse Doucet is a perfect work of narrative non-fiction: it is not only cleverly constructed and brilliantly researched, but each and every element is handled with extraordinary sensitivity and warmth – it will move you to tears or make you laugh, or perhaps both. Informed by decades of excellent reporting, Doucet centres the real-life experiences of people – the staff and guests, alongside the hotel itself – and with the future of Afghanistan still being written, this book’s importance will only get stronger as the years go by.”
