Imani Perry, Megha Mujamdar, Angela Flournoy Among Kirkus Prize 2025 Finalists — See the Full List!

Introducing the 2025 Kirkus Prize finalists!

The Kirkus Review journal announced its list of finalists on Aug. 26, naming 18 books between the Fiction, Nonfiction and Young Readers’ Literature categories. The three winning authors, each of whom will receive a $50,000 reward, will be announced at an awards ceremony in New York City on Oct. 8.

Fiction finalists include The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai (Hogarth), a tale of the bond between two Indian writers; The Wilderness by Angela Flournoy (Mariner Books), which follows generations of millennial Black women’s friendship; and Isola by Allegra Goodman (Dial Press), a historical thriller set on a desert island.

The list rounds out with A Guardian and a Thief by Megha Majumdar (Knopf), a tale of scarcity, climate change and desperation; The Slip by Lucas Schaefer (Simon & Schuster), which sees a teenager inside a boxing gym’s hidden plot; and Flesh by David Szalay (Scribner), an exploration of “manliness” at the intersection of wealth and emotional damage.

Nonfiction finalists include King of Kings: The Iranian Revolution: A Story of Hubris, Delusion and Catastrophic Miscalculation by Scott Anderson (Doubleday); Baldwin: A Love Story by Nicholas Boggs (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), which centers on the dynamic artist; A Marriage at Sea: and A True Story of Love, Obsession, and Shipwreck by Sophie Elmhirst (Riverhead), which puts a complex spin on escapism.

The list concludes with America, América: A New History of the New World by Greg Grandin (Penguin Press), an “authoritative history” of the dark side of the U.S., Black in Blues: How a Color Tells the Story of My People by Imani Perry (Ecco/HarperCollins), which expands on the color blue’s role in Black culture; and Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy (Scribner), a memoir on the author’s complicated bond with her mother.

The Young Readers’ Literature finalists are divided into three groups: picture books, middle grade and young adult.

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The picture book finalists are Island Storm by Brian Floca, illustrated by Sydney Smith (Holiday House/Neal Porter), which combines the power of nature with the power of “pushing limits:” and Everybelly by Thao Lam (Groundwood), “A unique, joyful celebration of bellies, bodies and beauty.”

Middle grade finalists include The Incredibly Human Henson Blayze by Derrick Barnes (Viking), about a young football player’s reckoning with what’s important to him; and John the Skeleton by Triinu Laan, illustrated by Marja-Liisa Plats, translated by Adam Cullen (Restless/Yonder), which seeks to demystify death as “a beloved part of life.”

The young adult finalists are Butterfly Heart by Moa Backe Åstot, translated by Agnes Broomé (Levine Querido), a digital-era tale of grief, identity and life; and Death in the Jungle: Murder, Betrayal and the Lost Dream of Jonestown by Candace Fleming (Anne Schwartz/Random House), which centers on the 1978 tragedy in the Guyanese jungle.

The winners of each category will be announced on Oct. 8 at a ceremony in TriBeca, and livestreamed at 7:30 p.m. ET on Kirkus’ YouTube channel.