The 2026 Prize
The 2026 Walter Scott Prize was won by Alice Jolly for her novel The Matchbox Girl, which tells the story of Adelheid Brunner, a patient of Dr Hans Asperger in the now-infamous Vienna Children’s Hospital during the 1930s, while the city is under Nazi occupation. Alice received her prize from Walter Scott’s great-great-great-great grandson, Matthew Maxwell Scott, at a ceremony at the Borders Book Festival on Thursday 11thJune.
The judges said:
“Originality, innovation, ambition – The Matchbox Girl not only more than fulfils the judging criteria for the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction, it confronts a topic of immense complexity in a gripping tour de force. With the skill of a cubist painter, Alice Jolly has altered the angle from which events in Vienna in 1934, and particularly in the Vienna Children’s Hospital, are observed, and a story we think we know is disrupted by a heroine who is speechless yet speaks with disturbing energy. The Matchbox Girl may be the most unusual book you read this year. For its honesty, power and storytelling dexterity, our 2026 winner will also be one of the most important.”
You can see our announcement video here:
The 2026 Shortlist comprised:
THE PRETENDER by Jo Harkin (Bloomsbury)
THE MATCHBOX GIRL by Alice Jolly (Bloomsbury)
BENBECULA by Graeme Macrae Burnet (Polygon)
ONCE THE DEED IS DONE by Rachel Seiffert (Virago)
SEASCRAPER by Benjamin Wood (Viking)
Spanning the centuries from the 1480s to the 1950s, the novels cover events and locations from the English Wars of the Roses to Austria and Germany during the Second World War, and a shocking true crime committed on a Hebridean island to an imagined encounter in a small community on the northwest coast.
The judges said:
“The five shortlisted novels for the 2026 Walter Scott Prize probe intimate lives lived in both small and big settings. Readers will hear voices usually unheard but which, once heard, won’t be forgotten. The shortlist choice is always difficult, but our authors each reveal the hidden, and in doing so offer new insights into our own times as well as the times in which their novels are set. Above all, our five authors are storytellers, so if you like a good story, the 2026 Walter Scott Prize shortlist is one you won’t want to miss.”
The shortlist announcement was accompanied by a video shot at Abbotsford and narrated by James Naughtie, which you can see here.
The Walter Scott Prize 2027 Timetable
end August 2026 Prize opens for submissions from publishers
31 October 2026 Closing date for submissions
February 2027 Longlist announced
March/April 2027 Shortlist announced
17-20 June 2027 Borders Book Festival – 2027 winner announced