BRITISH Asian Sunjeev Sahota is among 13 authors longlisted for this year's Booker Prize for fiction for China Room, a novel judges described as a “brilliant twist” on the immigrant experience.
Sahota, 40, has previously been shortlisted for the 2015 Booker Prize for his book, The Year of the Runaways and is a winner of the European Union Prize for Literature in 2017.
Sahota’s grandparents emigrated from Punjab in the 1960s.
His novel China Room was chosen from 158 published in the UK or Ireland between October 2020 and September 2021. The Booker Prize is open to works by writers of any nationality, written in English and published in the UK or Ireland.
“Weaving together two timelines and two continents, ‘China Room' struck us as a brilliant twist on the novel of immigrant experience, considering in subtle and moving ways the trauma handed down from one generation to the next,” the Booker Prize judges said on Tuesday (27).
“In crisp, clean prose, and with a dash of melodramatic action, Sahota turns these heavy themes into something filled with love, hope and humour,” they said.
Sahota is joined on the 2021 longlist by previous winner British Japanese author Kazuo Ishiguro for ‘Klara and the Sun' and other previously shortlisted authors South African Damon Galut for ‘The Promise' and American Richard Powers for ‘Bewilderment'.
The 13 books on this year's longlist also include ‘A Passage North' by Sri Lankan author Anuk Arudpragasam; ‘Second Place' by British-Canadian author Rachel Cusk; ‘The Sweetness of Water' by American writer Nathan Harris; ‘An Island' by South African Karen Jennings; ‘A Town Called Solace' by Cabnadian Maya Lawson; ‘No One is Talking About this' by American Patricia Lockdwood; ‘The Fortune Men' by British-Somali Nadifa Mohamed; ‘Great Circle' by American Maggie Shipstead; and ‘Light Perpetual' by British Francis Spufford.
"One thing that unites these books is their power to absorb the reader in an unusual story, and to do so in an artful, distinctive voice,” said historian Maya Jasanoff, Chair of the 2021 judging panel.
A shortlist of six books will be announced in London on September 14 and those authors will receive £2,500 and a specially bound edition of their book.
The 2021 winner, who will receive £50,000, will be announced on November 3 in an award ceremony held in partnership with the BBC at Broadcasting House's Radio Theatre.
A 1996 photo of rapper Tupac Shakur (L) and Marion "Suge" Knight is shown on screens during closing arguments in the Duane Davis murder trial, related to the 1996 killing of rapper Tupac Shakur, at Clark County District Court at the Regional Justice Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, on August 31, 2026. Getty Images
A rescuer assists a resident through heavy mud following flash floods on August 27, 2026 in Trishuli, Nepal. A sudden flood swept through the Bhote Koshi River basin in northern Rasuwa on August 26, damaging settlements, roads and energy infrastructure as rescue teams searched for residents and foreign travellers reported out of contact. Hundreds were reported missing, as the death toll started to climb.Getty Images
Rescue personnel provide medical treatment to a child at an army rescue camp in Trishuli Batar, Nepal, on August 27, 2026. A sudden flood swept through the Bhote Koshi River basin in northern Rasuwa on August 26, damaging settlements, roads and energy infrastructure, as rescue teams searched for residents and foreign travellers reported out of contact. Hundreds were reported missing as the death toll began to climb. Getty Ima
Family members of missing flood victims react at the emergency ward of the Maharajgunj Medical Campus, part of the Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, on August 28, 2026 in Kathmandu, Nepal. Authorities said the flash floods were triggered after a mass of ice, mud and rock collapsed into a Himalayan river near the Nepal-China border, leaving hundreds dead or missing and causing widespread damage in affected districts. Authorities continued the gruelling search for victims, many buried under metres of mud, as both China and Nepal issued fresh flooding alerts.Getty Images