The 2026 Miles Franklin Literary Award Longlist

We are thrilled to share that the 2026 Miles Franklin Literary Award Longlist has been announced. Congratulations to Randa, Steve and the other longlisted authors!

Perpetual, the trustee of the Miles Franklin Literary Award, has unveiled this year’s longlist, featuring ten novels that collectively offer a portrayal of Australian life in all its diversity. Bringing together stories shaped by varied cultural backgrounds, voices and experiences, this selection celebrates the richness and complexity of Australian storytelling today. The works, which include two former longlist winners and one past short-listee, showcase the talent and creativity of authors from across the nation and set the stage for an exciting journey toward the prestigious award.

The Award celebrates novels of the highest literary merit that tell stories about Australian life. The winner will receive $60,000.

Longlisted UQP titles for the prize include:

• Discipline (Randa Abdel-Fattah, University of Queensland Press)
• First Name Second Name (Steve MinOn, University of Queensland Press)
  

This year’s judges are Richard Neville, Mitchell Librarian of the State Library of NSW, as chair, and literary scholars Jumana Bayeh, Mridula Nath Chakraborty, Tony Hughes-d’Aeth and Maggie Nolan.

According to the judging panel, “Destabilised histories, faltering memories and chequered geographies meet in the pages of the 2026 Miles Franklin longlist. From Far North Queensland to Tasmania and all the way to remote Western Australia, these novels remind us of the vastness of this continent, the many times and places that Australian stories inhabit, and the global networks in which ‘Australian life’ is invariably embedded. This year’s longlist is haunted by ancestral inheritances, the human capacity for self-deception, and the ways we make space for grief. These novels hold up mirrors to little worlds and large ones too.”

This year’s shortlist will be announced in June, with the winner announcement to follow in August.

The 2025 Miles Franklin Literary Award winner was Siang Lu for his novel Ghost Cities(University of Queensland Press).

There is more information about the award available on award trustee Perpetual Limited’s website.