Georgina Godwin

At its best, a summer reading list isn’t one list at all. It’s a set of options matched to conditions and mood. What you might want to read on a plane isn’t the same as what you’d want to read on a beach lounger at 16.00, half asleep and sun-drunk – or even drunk-drunk. It’s about finding books that match both mindset and situation. Long-haul flights need scale, something big enough to swallow the hours.

The winners of the 2026 Women’s Prize, one of the world’s most prestigious literary accolades, have been announced. Virginia Evans and Lyse Doucet, both debut authors, won in the fiction and non-fiction categories respectively. Their paths to publication were vastly different. Evans spent years writing books that never found a publisher until her debut, The Correspondent, became a breakthrough success.

The Russian political activist's second book outlines her experience in a penal colony, the art of protest under authoritarian rule and amplifying the voices of Russia's unheard political prisoners. Maria Alyokhina is a Russian political activist known for her work as a member of Pussy Riot, the feminist protest group. The collective was thrust into the global spotlight in 2012 after an audacious performance inside Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Saviour.