Every year, France, Japan, Brazil and more crown their best book. Spin the globe to see which ones you can read in English, and which are still waiting.
4,667 books · 44 prizes · 39 countries
Showing 47 of 162 books. 115 aren’t in English yet: show all.
Augustpriset 2024 · Shortlist
Hyper
Agri Ismaïl · 43 when first published
Novel · 464 pages · Family, Migration
AI-generated summary:Rafiq, a Kurd, escapes Tehran by night with his wife and their three children and tries to start again in London, but cannot get past everything he has left behind.
Augustpriset 2023 · Winner
Jävla karlar
Andrev Walden · 47 when first published
Novel · 288 pages · Autofiction, Coming of age, Family
AI-generated summary:Christmas 1983, outside Norrköping: during a furious row, seven-year-old Andrev is told the man he calls Dad isn't his father. His real one lives abroad, yet all that arrives is a series of stand-in fathers.
Augustpriset 2023 · Shortlist
Systrarna
Jonas Hassen Khemiri · 45 when first published
Novel · 656 pages · Family, Migration
AI-generated summary:Three mysterious sisters, Swedish-born but talking English among themselves, move into Jonas's neighbourhood, and he slowly discovers that their family and his father's history are intertwined.
Augustpriset 2022 · Winner
Detaljerna
Ia Genberg · 55 when first published
Novel · 144 pages
AI-generated summary:Laid low by fever, a woman finds herself visited by figures from her past: a future celebrity who once wrote to her, a companion who vanished without trace, a lover she could never keep.
Also: International Booker 2024 shortlist
Augustpriset 2022 · Shortlist
Björnjägarens döttrar
Anneli Jordahl · 62 when first published
Novel · 400 pages · Family, Nature
AI-generated summary:A local historian sets out to write down the scandalous tale of the Leskinen sisters, seven daughters of a bear hunter who live wild and alone deep in the Finnish forest.
Augustpriset 2022 · Shortlist
Ixelles
Johannes Anyuru · 43 when first published
Novel · 468 pages
AI-generated summary:Since Mio died, Rut has brought up their son alone while working for a secretive agency that steers public opinion with invented voices. Then a boy in a coma is found with a recording of Mio speaking.
Augustpriset 2022 · Shortlist
Djävulsgreppet
Lina Wolff · 49 when first published
Novel · 288 pages · Love
AI-generated summary:A woman from a harsh northern place arrives in Florence, dazzled and unsettled, hoping her new lover will melt the frost inside her. Instead their relationship becomes a hold that keeps tightening.
Augustpriset 2021 · Winner
Eufori
Elin Cullhed · 38 when first published
Novel · 292 pages · Historical, Family
AI-generated summary:A fictional account of Sylvia Plath's final year: elated, desperate, possessive and full of ambition, she adores her children and craves time to write, while Ted Hughes leaves the household to her.
Augustpriset 2021 · Shortlist
Singulariteten
Balsam Karam · 38 when first published
Novel · 194 pages
AI-generated summary:On a coastal road by the sea, a mother hunts for her missing daughter until grief drives her out of her mind. A pregnant tourist sees someone go over the edge of the cliffs.
Augustpriset 2020 · Winner
Samlade verk
Lydia Sandgren · 33 when first published
Novel · 608 pages · Family, Love
AI-generated summary:Gothenburg is preparing a big show of the painter Gustav Becker, and the student Rakel sees her long-vanished mother's face on posters all over town, while her father, the publisher Martin Berg, falls into crisis.
Augustpriset 2019 · Winner
Osebol
Marit Kapla · 49 when first published
Nonfiction · 800 pages
AI-generated summary:Almost every adult in Osebol, a village of about forty people beside the Klarälven river in northern Värmland, tells their life to a journalist raised there, and the interviews are shaped into lyrical testimony.
Also: Warwick Prize 2022 winner
Augustpriset 2019 · Shortlist
W.
Steve Sem-Sandberg · 61 when first published
Novel · 352 pages · Historical, War, Crime
AI-generated summary:To escape destitution, a solitary young man joins the army and is swept through the wars of early-nineteenth-century Europe, in a novel built on the real case behind Woyzeck.
Augustpriset 2018 · Winner
Ædnan
Linnea Axelsson · 38 when first published
Poetry · 448 pages · Historical, Family
AI-generated summary:Early in the twentieth century, a Sámi family follows its herd along the old migration trail to summer grazing on a Norwegian island. Soon a closed border will cut them off from that life.
Also: National Book Award 2024 finalist
Augustpriset 2018 · Shortlist
Jag for ner till bror
Karin Smirnoff · 54 when first published
Novel · 318 pages · Family, Crime
AI-generated summary:Jana Kippo, who as a girl once went for her father with a hayfork, comes back to Smalånger, a remote village in northern Sweden, to her twin brother, and takes a job caring for the elderly.
Augustpriset 2017 · Winner
De kommer att drunkna i sina mödrars tårar
Johannes Anyuru · 38 when first published
Novel · 300 pages · Politics, Speculative
AI-generated summary:On a winter night three supporters of the collapsing Daesh storm a bookshop during a provocative artist's talk and take the audience hostage. One of them, a young woman meant to film the attack, is hiding something that could change everything.
Augustpriset 2016 · Winner
De polyglotta älskarna
Lina Wolff · 43 when first published
Novel · 256 pages · Love
AI-generated summary:Max Lamas, an author, wants a lover who can talk with him in every language he knows. Ellinor, thirty-six, from a small place in Skåne, advertises for a gentle man, though not too gentle. Lucrezia sees her grandmother fade away in an empty palazzo.
Augustpriset 2016 · Shortlist
Eländet
Andrzej Tichý · 38 when first published
Novel · 176 pages
AI-generated summary:Waiting for his fellow musicians at Slussen in Malmö, a cellist runs into a young man living rough, and a flood of voices, recollections and half-lost languages starts to take over his mind.
Augustpriset 2016 · Shortlist
Välkommen till Amerika
Linda Boström Knausgård · 44 when first published
Novel · 91 pages · Family, Coming of age
AI-generated summary:A girl fell silent long ago. Her mother, a stage actress, and her brother, who has nailed his door shut, have adapted, and now and then her dead father is waiting on her bed. She believes she caused his death.
Augustpriset 2016 · Shortlist
Aftonland
Therese Bohman · 38 when first published
Novel · 208 pages · Love
AI-generated summary:Karolina, a professor at Stockholm University living alone after a long relationship, takes on a confident new PhD student who claims that a forgotten woman artist will rewrite Swedish art history.
Augustpriset 2015 · Winner
Allt jag inte minns
Jonas Hassen Khemiri · 37 when first published
Novel · 306 pages · Love
AI-generated summary:A writer sets out to reconstruct the last day of Samuel's life, talking to his friends, relatives and neighbours. From their clashing accounts emerge Samuel, his friend Vandad and Laide, the woman he loved.
Augustpriset 2015 · Shortlist
Spådomen
Agneta Pleijel · 75 when first published
Novel · 272 pages · Autofiction, Coming of age, Family
AI-generated summary:Born in 1940, a girl grows up between Stockholm's suburbs, the United States and Lund, watching for a prophecy once made to her beloved aunt to come true, while her parents' marriage turns into a war zone.
Augustpriset 2015 · Shortlist
Rörelsen
John Ajvide Lindqvist · 47 when first published
Novel · 288 pages · Speculative · Platserna, book 2
AI-generated summary:Autumn 1985: John Lindqvist, who hopes to earn his living doing magic tricks in restaurants, rents a gloomy flat on Luntmakargatan in Stockholm. Soon something behind a locked door in the basement laundry begins to change the building.
Augustpriset 2014 · Shortlist
Ma
Ida Börjel · 39 when first published
Poetry · 336 pages
AI-generated summary:Poems that try to give form to the dead while they are gone, named after a Japanese character that can mean void, pause or room, a god, time, memory, and also a mother.
Augustpriset 2014 · Shortlist
Beckomberga
Sara Stridsberg · 42 when first published
Novel · 286 pages · Family
AI-generated summary:When Jimmie Darling is admitted to Beckomberga psychiatric hospital in Stockholm, his twelve-year-old daughter Jackie starts going there every day, and once her mother leaves on a long trip, the wards are all she has.
Augustpriset 2014 · Shortlist
De utvalda
Steve Sem-Sandberg · 56 when first published
Novel · 576 pages · Historical, War
AI-generated summary:Between 1940 and 1945 the Spiegelgrund clinic in Vienna takes in children the Nazi authorities brand as surplus: orphans, misfits, the 'racially degenerate'. A young inmate, Adrian Ziegler, and a nurse, Anna Katschenka, stand at the centre.
Augustpriset 2013 · Winner
Egenmäktigt förfarande
Lena Andersson · 43 when first published
Novel · 195 pages · Love
AI-generated summary:Ester Nilsson, a level-headed poet and essayist in a level-headed relationship, is asked to give a talk on the artist Hugo Rask. He sits spellbound in the audience, and once it is over the two are introduced.
Augustpriset 2013 · Shortlist
Vitsvit
Athena Farrokhzad · 30 when first published
Poetry · 70 pages · Migration, Family, Politics
AI-generated summary:In one long poem, members of a family bound together by revolution and exile speak in turn about violence and whiteness; the speaker is heard only through the words she places in their mouths.
Augustpriset 2013 · Shortlist
Hägring 38
Kjell Westö · 52 when first published
Novel · 341 pages · Historical, Politics
AI-generated summary:Helsinki, 1938: the divorced lawyer Claes Thune takes on a capable, guarded clerk, Matilda Wiik. Then one evening, among his old friends of the Wednesday Club, she recognises a man from her past.
Also: Finlandia 2013 shortlist
Augustpriset 2013 · Shortlist
Liknelseboken
Per Olov Enquist · 79 when first published
Novel · 253 pages · Autofiction, Love, Family
AI-generated summary:An old writer wonders whether the eulogy he gave for his mother needs revising, as his father's notebook, its torn-out pages long thought burned, resurfaces and the memory of a first love asks to be told.
Augustpriset 2012 · Winner
Ett kort uppehåll på vägen från Auschwitz
Göran Rosenberg · 64 when first published
Nonfiction · 331 pages · Family, Historical
AI-generated summary:In August 1947 a young survivor of Łódź and Auschwitz arrives by train in a small Swedish town built around a lorry factory, hoping to start again. His son goes back over that journey and the life they shared.
Augustpriset 2012 · Shortlist
En storm kom från paradiset
Johannes Anyuru · 33 when first published
Novel · 252 pages · Migration, Politics
AI-generated summary:A young Ugandan dreams of flying for his country's air force and is sent to train as a pilot in Greece. Then, in January 1971, Idi Amin seizes power and the cadets are ordered home.
Augustpriset 2012 · Shortlist
Sång till den storm som ska komma
Peter Fröberg Idling · 40 when first published
Novel · 331 pages · Historical, Politics, Love
AI-generated summary:Late summer 1955: Cambodia prepares for its first free election since independence. Young Sar, later known as Pol Pot, works secretly for a communist uprising while officially serving the leader of the opposition.
Augustpriset 2011 · Winner
Korparna
Tomas Bannerhed · 45 when first published
Novel · 411 pages · Family, Coming of age, Nature
AI-generated summary:On a poor smallholding in Småland in the early 1970s, twelve-year-old Klas watches his father break down under the endless toil, yet the father insists that his son must one day take over the farm.
Augustpriset 2009 · Winner
De fattiga i Łódź
Steve Sem-Sandberg · 51 when first published
Novel · 664 pages · Historical, War
AI-generated summary:In occupied Poland the Nazis seal off a Jewish ghetto in Łódź and put Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski in charge of it. Amid hunger, forced labour and deportations, his deeply ambiguous leadership shapes the lives of its people.
Augustpriset 2008 · Winner
Ett annat liv
Per Olov Enquist · 74 when first published
Nonfiction · 391 pages · Autofiction
AI-generated summary:Writing of himself as "he", the author recalls growing up fatherless as the village teacher's son in Hjoggböle in Västerbotten, a temperance boy and promising high jumper who would become a writer.
Augustpriset 2006 · Shortlist
Montecore
Jonas Hassen Khemiri · 28 when first published
Novel · 320 pages · Family, Migration
AI-generated summary:The writer Jonas receives an email from Kadir, a childhood friend of his father's, who urges him in a strange home-made French-Arabic Swedish to write a book about his father, the famous photographer.
Augustpriset 2006 · Shortlist
Drömfakulteten
Sara Stridsberg · 34 when first published
Novel · 338 pages · Politics
AI-generated summary:In April 1988 Valerie Solanas lies dying of pneumonia on a filthy mattress in a hotel room in San Francisco's Tenderloin, and the narrator imagines herself beside her, writing her life.
Augustpriset 2005 · Winner
Den amerikanska flickan
Monika Fagerholm · 43 when first published
Novel · 528 pages · Coming of age, Crime
AI-generated summary:In the autumn of 1969 an American girl, Eddie, is found drowned in the District and her friend Björn hangs himself. Years later two girls, Sandra and Doris, start to reconstruct what happened.
Augustpriset 2004 · Winner
Gregorius
Bengt Ohlsson · 41 when first published
Novel · 432 pages · Historical, Love
AI-generated summary:Pastor Gregorius, the despised clergyman of Hjalmar Söderberg's Doctor Glas, tells the story of what will be his last summer, from his youth as a model son to his shameful love for the young Helga.
Augustpriset 2004 · Shortlist
Boken om Blanche och Marie
Per Olov Enquist · 70 when first published
Novel · 218 pages · Historical, Love
AI-generated summary:Blanche Wittman, once the most famous patient of the Paris neurologist Charcot, later becomes assistant to Marie Curie, and, maimed by radium, writes down her love for Charcot and Marie's affair with Langevin.
Augustpriset 2004 · Shortlist
Den stora gåtan
Tomas Tranströmer · 73 when first published
Poetry · 262 pages · Nature
AI-generated summary:Five poems and forty-five haiku in eleven sequences, short concentrated pieces about death, the riddles of life and the wonder of nature and human beings.
Augustpriset 2003 · Shortlist
Imago
Eva-Marie Liffner · 46 when first published
Novel · 256 pages · Crime, Historical
AI-generated summary:In 1938 a nineteenth-century soldier is found preserved in a bog on the Danish-German border; in 2000 a cleaner and amateur historian in Copenhagen stumbles on the documents about the find.
Augustpriset 2002 · Winner
Den vidunderliga kärlekens historia
Carl-Johan Vallgren · 38 when first published
Novel · 384 pages · Historical, Love
AI-generated summary:Hercule Barfuss, born in a Königsberg brothel in 1813, is deformed, a dwarf and deaf and mute, but he can read other people's thoughts and loves Henriette, a girl born in the brothel on the same night.
Augustpriset 2002 · Shortlist
Forsla fett
Aase Berg · 35 when first published
Poetry · 130 pages
AI-generated summary:Poems built from a shifting set of words, hare, whale, milk, shell, explore the tension between fullness and starvation, pregnancy and gravity, birth and being carried.
Augustpriset 2002 · Shortlist
Till Mervas
Elisabeth Rynell · 48 when first published
Novel · 192 pages · Love
AI-generated summary:Marta, a middle-aged woman who has long lived alone and cut off, receives a letter from Kostis, the love of her youth, sent from Mervas, a place in the far north she has never heard of.
Augustpriset 2001 · Shortlist
Lewis resa
Per Olov Enquist · 67 when first published
Novel · 468 pages · Historical, Politics
AI-generated summary:The life of Lewi Pethrus, founder of the Swedish Pentecostal movement, from working-class boy with dreams of becoming a writer to a spiritual leader conscious of his power.
Augustpriset 2000 · Winner
Populärmusik från Vittula
Mikael Niemi · 41 when first published
Novel · 237 pages · Coming of age
AI-generated summary:In the 1960s and 70s, Matti and his quiet friend Niila grow up in Vittula, a crowded district on the edge of Pajala in the far north of Sweden, where rock music arrives as the old ways resist change.