The 29th winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction has been announced from the shortlist of six novels and on the same evening the inaugural winner of the Women’s Prize for Nonfiction from the shortlist of six books.

2024 Fiction Winner

The Women’s Prize for Fiction was won by American author, V. V. Ganeshananthan, for her deeply moving, powerful second novel, Brotherless Night (my review), which depicts a family fractured by the Sri Lankan civil war.

‘Brotherless Night is a brilliant, compelling and deeply moving novel that bears witness to the intimate and epic-scale tragedies of the Sri Lankan civil war. In rich, evocative prose, Ganeshananthan creates a vivid sense of time and place and an indelible cast of characters. Her commitment to complexity and clear-eyed moral scrutiny combines with spellbinding storytelling to render Brotherless Night a masterpiece of historical fiction.’ Monica Ali, CHAIR OF JUDGES FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION

2024 NonFiction Winner

The Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction was awarded to Canadian bestselling writer, global activist and film-maker, Naomi Klein, for Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World; her urgent, illuminating examination of our polarised society.

‘This brilliant and layered analysis demonstrates humour, insight and expertise. Klein’s writing is both deeply personal and impressively expansive. Doppelganger is a courageous, humane and optimistic call-to-arms that moves us beyond black and white, beyond Right and Left, inviting us instead to embrace the spaces in between.’ Professor Suzzanah Lipscomb, CHAIR OF JUDGES FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION

Further Reading

The Guardian Article: Judges praised Klein’s Doppelganger for its ‘courageous’ study of truth in politics and called Ganeshananthan’s Brotherless Night a ‘masterpiece’ of historical fiction by Lucy Knight

Have you read either of these books? Let us know what you thought of them in the comments below.