The National Book Foundation has been releasing longlists for the 2026 National Book Awards this week, including most recently the Fiction category. Finalists will be announced on October 6, and winners named on November 18 at the 77th National Book Awards Ceremony. The longlisted titles for fiction are:
Fiction
Paradiso 17 by Hannah Lillith Assadi (Knopf)
Red Ants by Kimberly Blaeser (Counterpoint Press)
Dèy by Edwidge Danticat (Knopf)
Pretend You're Dead and I Carry You by Julián Delgado Lopera (Liveright)
Python's Kiss by Louise Erdrich (Harper)
The Disappearers by Marlon James (Riverhead Books)
Beginning Middle End by Valeria Luiselli (Knopf)
Passengers by Alexander Maksik (Europa Editions)
The Renovation by Kenan Orhan (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
Mad Eden by Morgan Thomas (MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux)