The Queen Mary Small Press Fiction Prize 2026 Longlist
We’re happy and proud to finally share the ten books on this year’s longlist—the first year of the prize with our new name and partner, Queen Mary University, London.
The longlisted titles and presses can be found below in press alphabetical order.
To read the full longlist announcement (as well as news about small press publishing, our sister prizes and sundry industry matters) subscribe to our Substack. That’s where you can read the shortlist first once it’s announced mid-March 2026.
The shortlist will be announced mid-March. DETAILS to follow.
The OVerall winner will be aNNounced at an event at Queen Mary University, London, Wednesday 25th March.
Thank you to every press that made a submission and to our HARDWORKING judges, Marina Benjamin, Susanna Crossman and Stu Hennigan
Aaaargh! Press
Divided Publishing
Époque Press
Hajar Press
Héloïse Press
Honford Star
Divided Press
Moist Books
Peirene Press
Small Axes/Hope Road
Tangerine Press
Aaaargh! Press Divided Publishing Époque Press Hajar Press Héloïse Press Honford Star Divided Press Moist Books Peirene Press Small Axes/Hope Road Tangerine Press
Toothpull of St. Dunstan b
y Kevin Davey
Aaaargh! Press
Our judges said: “A compelling experimental engagement with language and sound, Kevin Davey’s Toothpull of St. DunstaN is a modern Canterbury tale. Recalling Woolf’s Orlando, but in the company of a disarming time-travelling dentist, we career through seven centuries, pain and molars, from a medieval barber-surgeon via the Corn laws to soulless modern dentistry.”
Darryl b
y Jackie Ess
Divided Publishing
Our judges said: “This novel offers a wry, brainy take on kink. White, middle-aged and full of angst, DarRyl likes watching his wife have sex with other men but then falls for one of them himself. Perhaps he’s gay, he thinks, or perhaps he’s trans. Ess plays with the identity issues of the day in prose that’s winningly transparent, questioning, clever, yet always light. a delightful portrait of doubtful masculinity and sexual encounter as a portal to self-discovery.”
Spit by David Brennan
époque press
Our judges said: “a wonderfully warm, funny and inventive work that deploys an ingenious narrative sleight-of-hand to allow an omniscient, supernatural entity to observe the all-too-human existence of the inhabitants of a tiny Irish village.”
The First Jasmines by Saima Begum
Hajar Press
Our judges said: “a fiercely lyrical debut recounting the devastating untold story of BiraNgona—women kidnapped and raped by the Pakistan Army during the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971. An extraordinary work of vivid prose, unforgettable characters and visceral detail, spirit burns bright through these pages.”
The Weasel and the Whore by Martha Luisa Hernández Cadenas, translated by Julia Sanches and Jennifer Shyue
Héloïse Press
Our judges said: "A slantwise take on Cuba, post-Castro. In short chapters rendered as stylish outbursts, Hernández Cadenas’s narrator hurtles through her days falling in and out of love and friendship, the heat and mischief of the action broken Only by her bizarre sexual arrangement with ‘R’, who embodies the rot of the revolutionary old-guard from whose clutches she is desperate to free herself.”
Mistress Koharu by Noboru Tsujihara, translated by Kalau Almony
Honford Star
Our judges said: “Noboru Tsujihara is a celebrated voice in Japan and his first novel to be translated into English is a feast of clever cultural references and twisty plotting. A four-square play for power and love, it subjects a salaryman who fancies himself a philosopher and cineaste to the singular pursuit of three women—one a vivified sex-doll. a novel that circles headily around desire and frustration, intellect and attraction, and the cruelties of love.”
Ghost Driver by Nell Osbourne
Moist Books
Our judges said: “a shape-shifting gem powered by an effortlessly hip voice that crackles with restless energy. Its boundary-blurring blending of the personal with the political, and the uncanny with the mundane, is as BEGUILING and fresh as modern fiction gets.”
On the Greenwich Line by Shady Lewis, translated by Katharine Halls
Peirene Press
Our judges said: “A deft, Kafkaesque meander through the streets of London, On the Greenwich Line is an intriguing, cinematographically-paced novel. Through the eyes of unnamed Coptic Christian immigrant, we confront a deeply accurate deadpan examination of contemporary England’s bleak, farcical bureaucracy, racism and inequality: wry absurdity in the face of life and death.”
Small Boat by Vincent Delecroix, translated by Helen Stevenson
Small Axes/HopeRoad
Our judges said: “a dense and powerful novel for our times that examines how political and public discourse is allowed to frame the plight of refugees as an administrative problem while studiously ignoring the devastating reality of their lives.”
Figures Crossing the Field Towards the Group by Rebecca Gransden
Tangerine Press
Our Judges said: “A work of breathtaking originality in form, style and execution. Gransden’s startling stylistic innovations create a language that’s familiar and alien in equal measure, a soon-to-come Newspeak stripped back to the bare bones while recalling the ancient alliterative poetry of the Anglo-Saxons.”
Each longlisted press will receive £500 and an offer of PR surgery from our partners Tiger Team Creative. The longlisted presses and/or authors will also be offered the opportunity to appear at festivals and bookshops to talk about their experiences with the prize (details tbc). The shortlist will be announced mid-March with details tbc. Each shortlisted press will receive a further £1000, to be split 70% to the press and 30% to the writer (and the translator if applicable). The winning title won’t only get the glory this year, but the writer (or their translator where applicable) will receive a 5-day writing retreat at the Hawkwood Centre for Future Thinking.