The Disappearers by Marlon James — longlisted for the 2026 Booker Prize. A monumental new novel from the Booker Prize–winning author of A Brief History of Seven Killings.
Kingston, Jamaica, 1988. Eight men gather in secret to rehearse a dangerous play. They are strangers to one another, but they share one inescapable truth: they are gay in a world that refuses to accept them.
One night they are savagely attacked. One of them is killed. As the survivors try to recover, each chooses a different path. Some attempt to ignore what happened. Others seek retribution. Some disappear completely.
Spanning Kingston in the late 1980s and stretching across years and continents, The Disappearers is a propulsive story of violence, friendship, desire, and survival. It is also a deeply human portrait of queer life under threat — full of biting humor, unforgettable voices, and the raw energy that has made Marlon James one of the most celebrated writers of his generation.
James’s first realist novel set in Jamaica since A Brief History of Seven Killings, this is a work of extraordinary ambition and feeling: a crime story, a reckoning, and a fierce act of remembrance.
