The best short novels from the Booker Library

From classics to contemporary, we recommend a selection of slender Booker Prize-nominated titles, which may be small but are perfectly formed

It’s winter in the northern hemisphere and we are filled with the urge to hibernate. If you feel the same and want nothing more than to stay indoors with a few good books, allow us to recommend several slender novels, all of which have been nominated for the Booker Prize or International Booker Prize, to keep you company this weekend…

The Booker Prize Podcast: Three short books you can read in a single weekend

If you’d like to set yourself a manageable reading challenge before the week is out, let us introduce you to three Booker books you could tick off your TBR list in just a couple of days: Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan, Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald, and Boulder by Eva Baltasar, translated by Julia Sanches. Tune in to this week’s podcast episode to hear hosts Jo Hamya and James Walton discuss the merits of each book, and explain why these pocket-sized novels pack a big punch.

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10 of the best very short reads from the Booker Library

As the late, great Beryl Bainbridge once said, ‘Unless a writer is superb, I don’t think it’s enough just to go wuffling on’. A distinctive feature of Bainbridge’s novels – five of which were shortlisted for the Booker Prize – is that they were usually brief and to the point. ‘I write twelve pages to get one page,’ she said, ‘and I cut all the time.’

For her, every word had to count, with all superfluous detail jettisoned, but she was far from unique among the writers in the Booker canon in her approach. Dozens of Booker-nominated authors have been able to say more in roughly 200 pages (or less) than most writers manage to convey in novels three times that length.

Penelope Fitzgerald’s Offshore, which won the prize in 1979, is the shortest-ever book to win, at 141 pages. Anita Brookner’s witty 1984-prize winner Hotel du Lac is almost as short, while Ian McEwan’s On Chesil Beach, shortlisted in 2007, barely breaks 200 pages. Muriel Spark’s 1970 novella The Driver’s Seat, shortlisted for the Lost Man Booker, is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it 102 pages, while J.L. Carr’s A Month in the Country, shortlisted in 1980, is just two pages longer. 

Beyond these inimitable works, we’ve rounded up ten short novels from the Booker archives for those who think the best books needn’t outstay their welcome. From recently shortlisted works to hidden gems, these books show you that the finest fiction often comes in the smallest packages.

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Do you have a favourite short novel from the Booker Library? Let us know which books had you hooked in the comments below