As the official English language media partner for the German Book Prize 2026, we are delighted to announce the shortlist of six outstanding books. We extend our heartfelt congratulations to all the shortlisted authors and their publishers.
The jury has shortlisted the following six novels for the German Book Prize 2026:
Shida Bazyar: Die Lücken (Kiepenheuer & Witsch, September 2026)
Franziska Gänsler: Orca (Kein & Aber, August 2026) – also an NBG jury recommendation
Valeria Gordeev: Die Zikade entschlüpft ihrer goldglänzenden Hülle
(S. Fischer, August 2026)
Elias Hirschl: Schleifen (Paul Zsolnay, January 2026) – also an NBG jury recommendation
Peggy Mädler: Selbstregulierung des Herzens (Galiani, February 2026)
Dana Vonwinckel: Anton und Alma (Suhrkamp, September 2026)
What lies ahead? What remains? However uncertain the present may be, it is proving to be fertile ground for great literature. The six novels on the shortlist bear witness to this. These books sharpen our view of the past. They point to political crimes and portray the struggle against them – sometimes in tentative, sometimes in daring steps. They recount individual dreams and possibilities: forging one’s own path, harnessing the laws of science, experiencing the freedom of art and exploring what it means to live together. In many unexpected ways, we read of longing, friendship, love and violence. We are thrilled by the aesthetic richness these books contain, by their sheer delight in language. And there is still reason to laugh.
Jury comment on the shortlist
Shida Bazyar, Die Lücken, Kiepenheuer & Witsch
Shida Bazyar, born in 1988, studied literary writing in Hildesheim, and, in addition to writing, worked in youth education for many years. Her debut novel Nachts ist es leise in Teheran (The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran) came out in 2016, won the Blogger Literary Award, Ulla Hahn Prize, and Uwe Johnson Prize, among other awards. The English translation was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2026. Her second novel Drei Kameradinnen (Sisters in Arms) was longlisted for the German Book Prize. Her novels have sold over 120,000 copies and have been translated into 20 languages.
Jury comment: ‘Shida Bazyar finds compelling language for a long-suppressed chapter in Germany’s past. Die Lücken (“The Omissions”) tells of Jewish families, of those who profited from the Nazi regime, and of Kurdish and Iranian people seeking protection and refuge in Germany. Spanning roughly a hundred years, the language shifts between different periods, giving each its own distinct tone. In Heimesbach, a small, fictional village in the Hunsrück, we look behind the façade of provincial idyll and draw close to the characters – the living, the dead (yes, even a dead woman who narrates from beyond the grave) and those whose stories have been left untold. A novel that, with its transnational perspective, explores the boundaries of the Heimat novel and redefines the genre.’
Read a sample translation here.
Read our recommendation of Sisters in Arms, which was published in English translation by Scribe books, tr. Ruth Martin.
Foreign Rights Contact
Aleksandra Erakovic, aerakovic@kiwi-verlag.de, +49 221 376 85 56
Rights sold to
Italy: Fandango / World English: Scribe
Franziska Gänsler, Orca, Kein & Aber
Franziska Gänsler, born in 1987 in Augsburg, studied art and English in Berlin, Vienna, and Augsburg. In 2020, she made the short list for the Blogbuster Prize and was a finalist in the 28th Open Mike competition. After her highly acclaimed debut ‘Eternal Summer’ which was sold to several territories, and her second novel ‘Islands of Light‘, ‘Orca’ is her third book published by Kein & Aber. Franziska divides her time between Augsburg and Berlin.
Jury comment: ‘In her novel “Orca”, Franziska Gänsler describes much more than the friendship between two young women. She focuses on an entire generation which, in the wake of the Covid restrictions, is increasingly unable to negotiate its relationships through face-to-face interaction. Instead, its members communicate via messaging apps and social media. Class differences do not disappear as a result. While, in private, YouTube tutorials are supposed to help define the self, conflicts in the public sphere escalate. This closely observed story of a relationship is embedded in a scenario of radicalisation in which we as readers look around in utter disbelief and ask ourselves: How on earth can this be happening? “Orca” answers precisely this question by deftly bringing the personal and the social together.’
Read a sample translation here.
Read our recommendations of ‘Orca’, Eternal Summer (Published by Penguin US, tr. Imogen Taylor) and ‘Islands of Light’.
Foreign Rights Contact
Ronit Zafran, r.zafran@keiundaber.ch, +41 44 297 12 22
Valeria Gordeev, Die Zikade entschlüpft ihrer goldglänzenden Hülle, S. Fischer
Valeria Gordeev was born in Tübingen in 1986. She works as an author and illustrator. She has received numerous awards for her writing. In 2023, she won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize at the 47th Days of German-Language Literature in Klagenfurt. “The Cicada Slips Out of Its Shiny Golden Shell” is her debut novel, which was awarded the Jürgen Ponto Foundation Literature Prize in 2026.
Jury comment: ‘Valeria Gordeev’s novel “Die Zikade entschlüpft ihrer goldglänzenden Hülle” (“The Cicada Slips from its Gleaming Golden Shell”) draws on an impressive array of literary devices. It is told from different perspectives, in different voices and through multiple storylines that come together to form a greater whole. The novel is set in Germany, Ukraine and Russia. Against the backdrop of war in Europe, an authoritarian regime and the megalomania of a man who desperately longs to be immortal, a pair of siblings try to find their way. With this wide-ranging work, Gordeev places herself in the tradition of those modernist writers who confronted injustice and oppression using the grotesque and humour, the absurd and the surreal.’
Read a sample translation here.
Foreign Rights Contact
Dr. Elisa Diallo, elisa.diallo@fischerverlage.de, +49 (0)696062376
Elias Hirschl, Schleifen, Zsolnay
Elias Hirschl was born in Vienna in 1994. He works as a writer, slam poet and musician. He received the Reinhard Priessnitz Prize in 2020 and most recently the Düsseldorf Prize for Literature 2026. His publications include Meine Freunde haben Adolf Hitler getötet (2016), Hundert schwarze Nähmaschinen (2017), and most recently published by Zsolnay “Salonfähig (2021) and ‘Content’ (2024).
Jury comment: ‘A fanatical linguist, a cult-like linguistic guerrilla group and the quest for the absolutely just language: with Schleifen (“Loops”), Elias Hirschl presents a wonderfully over-the-top novel that sparkles with intellectual wordplay, narrative tricks and a sheer, inexhaustible wealth of ideas.
Anyone who embarks on this completely mad ride through linguistics, mathematics, philosophy, sociology and medicine will find it almost impossible to resist the novel’s pull and will want to plunge ever deeper into the absurd. A novel that confuses and challenges us in the best possible way – and, above all, makes us laugh out loud.’
Read a sample translation here.
Read our recommendations of ‘Loops’ and ‘Content’.
Foreign Rights Contact
Annette Lechner, annette.lechner@zsolnay.at, +43 (0)1 5057661-12
Peggy Mädler: Selbstregulierung des Herzens
Peggy Mädler, born in Dresden in 1976, is a dramatist and author. She is a co-founder of the artist group “Laboratory for Counterfactual Thinking,” and was involved in the theater collective She She Pop.
Jury comment: “Peggy Mädler tells, with empathy and composure, and drawing on a wealth of factual knowledge, of a rarely explored chapter of East German history. Her characters, whose inner conflicts she illuminates with remarkable psychological insight, are not vociferous resistance fighters, but quiet dissidents who, under political pressure, must repeatedly adapt the dreams they have for their lives while nevertheless remaining true to themselves and their ideals. It is impressive how she succeeds in connecting these life stories with the field of cybernetics, repeatedly revealing astonishing parallels. At the same time, “Selbstregulierung des Herzens” (“Self-regulation of the Heart”) is a great novel about the creativity with which science and art find their way even under the most difficult conditions – and is therefore as relevant today as ever.”
Foreign Rights Contact
Aleksandra Erakovic, aerakovic@kiwi-verlag.de, +49 221 376 85 56
Dana Vowinckel: Anton und Alma
Dana Vowinckel was born in Berlin in 1996 into an American-Jewish-German family. She grew up bilingually and biculturally between Chicago and Berlin, and studied linguistics and literature in Berlin, Toulouse, and Cambridge. Her debut novel Misophonia won, amongst others, the Mara Cassens Prize and the literature prize of the Association of Arts and Culture of the German Economy, and was shortlisted for the prestigious Leipzig Book Fair Prize. She lives in Berlin.
Jury comment: ‘Dana Vowinckel’s Anton und Alma (“Anton and Alma”) is a compellingly told story of love and family, as well as a contemporary political novel, set in Berlin and New York. One of the book’s strengths is the convincing way its eponymous characters move between intimacy and distance. At the same time, the characters’ individual fates are intertwined with global political events, resulting in a multi-layered reflection on society, religion and family, and specifically on Judaism and antisemitism. Just how closely their love story and contemporary history are intertwined becomes apparent when, in parallel with the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict following the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, events in Berlin take a dramatic turn.’
Read a sample translation here.
Foreign Rights Contact
Nora Mercurio, mercurio@suhrkamp.de, +49-30-740744-231
