Who’s On The Longlist For The Second Annual Women’s Prize For Non-Fiction?

Last year, the Women’s Prize presented its very first Non-Fiction award, dubbing Doppelganger by Naomi Klein the best title of the year. Tracing Klein’s experiences of getting chronically mistaken for a woman who shares her name but dispenses radically different views to her online, Doppelganger delves into the underbelly of the internet, exploring identity, conspiracy theories, wellness influences and the outward-facing branding we all polish for our digital identities.

So who’s on the longlist for the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction this year? The second ever longlist has landed. Here are the titles to delve into next.

Women’s Prize For Non-Fiction 2025: The Longlist

Sixteen non-fiction books written in English and published between 1 April 2024 and 31 March 2025 have made it onto the second annual Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction longlist. They are:

• Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World by Anna Applebaum
• Embers of the Hands: Hidden Histories of the Viking Age by Eleanor Barrclough
• The Eagle and the Hart: The Tragedy of Richard II and Henry IV by Helen Castor
• A Thousand Threads by Neneh Chery
• The Story of A Heart by Rachel Clarke
• Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton
• Ootlin by Jenni Fagan
• Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love and the Hidden Order of Life by Lulu Miller
• Agent Zo: The Untold Stories of Fearless WW2 Resistance Fighter Elżbieta Zawacka by Clare Mulley
• By the Fire We Carry: The Generations-Long Fight for Justice on Native Land by Rebecca Nagle
• Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin by Sue Prideaux
• What the Wild Sea Can Be: The Future of the World’s Ocean by Helen Scales
• The Peepshow: The Murders at 10 Rillington Place by Kate Summerscale
• Sister in Law: Fighting for Justice in a System Designed by Men by Harriet Wistrich
• Tracker by Alexis Wright
• Private Revolutions: Coming of Age in a New China by Yuan Yang

Meet The Longlistees

British writers dominate the 2025 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction longlist, with 11 of the 16 authors up for the prize hailing from the UK. Within the ‘non-fiction’ umbrella, genres range from reportage on contemporary issues to revisionist history, insightful memoirs to myth-busting biographies, forgotten criminal cases to intimate narratives shining a light on ordinary people. As for the writers themselves, everyone from a music icon to a newly elected MP to an NHS palliative care doctor are represented. Of the 16 longlistees, six are commended for their debut work, sitting on the list alongside celebrated established writers including a Pulitzer Prize winner.

‘Judging the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction has been a huge privilege, and reading the books submitted has been both enlightening and enriching,’ says the 2025 chair of judges, Kavita Puri. ‘My fellow judges and I are thrilled with the selection of 16 books on this year’s longlist. What unites these diverse titles, that boast so many different disciplines and genres, is the accomplishment of the writing, the originality of the storytelling and the incisiveness of the research. Here are books that provoke debate and discussion, that offer insight into new experiences and perspectives, and that bring overlooked stories back to life and recognition. Amongst this stellar list, there are also reads that expertly steer us through the most pressing issues of our time, show the resilience of the human spirit, alongside others that elucidate the dangers of unchecked power, the consequence of oppression and the need for action and defiance.’

What Next?

Next, the longlist will be whittled down into a shortlist, which will be revealed by the Women’s Prize on Wednesday 26 March 2025. The winner of the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction 2025 will then be revealed at a ceremony on Thursday 12 June 2025, along with the winner of the sister Fiction prize. The winner will receive £30,000 and an artwork known as the ‘Charlotte’, both gifted by the Charlotte Aitken Trust.

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