Women AutHer Awards announces 2026 longlists in fiction, nonfiction, debut, children’s categories

The longlists of the 2026 Women AutHer Awards, presented by The Times of India and JK Paper, were announced on Sunday, March 8. The awards are presented to Indian women writers in four categories – fiction, non-fiction, children’s literature, and debut – as well as the popular choice and manuscript categories. The winners will be chosen by juries, and, in the case of the popular choice, through online voting. The winning authors receive cash prizes of Rs 1 lakh each, with the amount being shared equally by joint winners.

Here are the complete longlists:

Fiction

• Blood Caste, Shylashri Shankar

• The Comeback, Annie Zaidi

• Real Life, Amrita Mahale

• Rising Sons, Kavery Nambisan

• The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, Kiran Desai

• The Remnants of a Rebellion, Ponnu Elizabeth Mathew

• The Courtesan, Her Lover and I, Tarana Husain Khan

• The Guardian and a Thief, Megha Majumdar

Nonfiction

• In the Beginning There Was Bombay Duck: A Food History of Mumbai, Pronoti Datta

• Rubber: The Social and Natural History of an Indispensable Substance, Vidya Rajan

• A Man For All Seasons: The Life Of KM Panikkar, Narayani Basu

• The Maker of Filmmakers: How Jagat Murari and FTII Changed Indian Cinema Forever, Radha Chadha

• Scamlands: Inside the Asian Empire of Fraud That Preys on the World, Snigdha Poonam

• India’s First Radicals: Young Bengal and the British Empire, Rosinka Chaudhuri

• Called by the Hills: A Home in the Himalaya, Anuradha Roy

• Farmers Protest!: A Movement for Our Times, Namita Waikar

Debut

• Invisible in Plain Sight: Voices From the By-Lanes of Kamathipura, Swati Pandey

• Lifequake: A Story of Hope and Humanity, Tarini Mohan

• Lōal Kashmir:...

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