The 2025 Edinburgh International Book Festival is now fast approaching, with almost 700 events lined up and 641 writers scheduled to attend.
Among these talented authors are a number of previous Booker Prize nominees and winners, including last year’s winner Samantha Harvey and the legendary Ian McEwan.
And with the 2025 Booker Prize longlist set to be announced on Tuesday, July 29, there is no better time to reflect on past nominees for one of the world’s most significant literature prizes.
With this year’s festival taking place from August 9 to 24 in its new home at the Edinburgh Futures Institute, tickets are now available with some already having sold out.
So if you’re ready to book and are in need of some inspiration, here are the 25 past Booker Prize nominees attending the 2025 Edinburgh International Book Festival.
5. Ali Smith
Scottish writer Ali Smith has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize four-times, for works including Hotel World (2001), The Accidental (2005), How to Be Both (2014) and Autumn (2017). Returning to Edinburgh for the 2025 Book Festival, Smith will discuss the follow up to Gliff – due out next year – at Venue T on Sunday, August 17. | AFP via Getty Images
6. James Kelman
Scottish writer James Kelman will speak during the Edinburgh International Book Festival about his new collection of short stories and selected interviews on Sunday, August 17. He is a two-time Booker Prize nominee and in 1994 won for his Glasgow-set novel How Late It Was, How Late. | Greg Macvean Photo: Greg Macvean
7. Rachel Kushner
American author Rachel Kushner has been nominated for two Booker Prizes, once in 2018 for The Mars Room and again in 2024 for Creation Lake. She will appear at the Edinburgh International Book Festival with her panel Profound and Wickedly Entertaining on Sunday, August 10 at the Courtyard Theatre, as well as for event These Days with James Rebanks for a talk chaired by Malachy Tallack at Venue B on Monday, August 11. | AFP via Getty Images
8. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
If you were hoping to see Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie during the 2025 Edinburgh International Book Festival, you may already be out of luck as tickets to her The Front List discussion have already sold out. She is known for works such as Half of a Yellow Sun and Americanah, but was nominated for the Booker Prize in 2004 for her novel Purple Hibiscus when she was just 27 years old. | Getty Images for The Met Museum/