The Reader unveils new Bookshelf for 2026

The UK’s biggest Shared Reading charity today launches its 6th annual Reader Bookshelf - a carefully curated collection of stories, plays, and poems - at the start of the National Year of Reading 2026. 

‘The Home We Carry’ is the theme of a Liverpool Shared Reading charity’s latest annual Bookshelf recommendations for adults and children marking the inaugural National Year of Reading 2026. 

Top authors have welcomed their inclusion in The Reader’s Reader Bookshelf 2026, a carefully curated collection of 24 books for adults and children exploring a different theme each year, including Margaret McDonald, who at 27-years-old became the youngest ever winner of the Carnegie medal for writing in June 2025. 

Her coming-of-age novel debut novel Glasgow Boys, about two boys who have grown up in care, is one of 12 titles for children on the Bookshelf. Margaret said: “For Glasgow Boys to be included in this Bookshelf is very special...The Home We Carry is such an evocative notion that encompasses the truth of home, that it is a sense of belonging that we can take with us and can feel anywhere in the world.”  

The Reader, the UK’s largest Shared Reading charity, has developed the Bookshelf over the last six years as a tool for sharing the enthusiasm and experience of the charity’s staff and volunteers across the country and around the world. It consists of a diverse range of literature sure to spark connections, thoughts and feelings in the 500 Shared Reading groups held regularly across the UK, and any reader looking for a highly regarded yet surprising source of book recommendations.  

The launch of this year’s Reader Bookshelf coincides with the start of the Department of Education-led National Year of Reading 2026, and will be a rich and reliable source of inspiration for anyone who wants to make reading a regular part of their lives. 

Katie Clark, Director of Literature at The Reader, based in Calderstones Park, Liverpool, said: “We can look for it, long for it, thrive in it or flee from it – ‘home’ isn’t a place, it’s a constellation of feelings, ideas and associations we carry round with us always. It looks different for every different person – it could be a community, a country, a room or a bed; it could be a person, or a memory. For some, home is an absence; for others, it’s their journey’s end.  

“In 2026, The Reader has gathered the best literature to help us find a shared language for the home we carry.” 

Twelve stories, plays and poems have each been chosen for adults and children.  

Recommendations for adults include Samantha Harvey’s 2023 Booker Prize-winning novel Orbital about six astronauts who feel the pull of home from space to The Home-Maker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher, an intimate portrait of home-life in 1920s America. Other picks include Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi, Stand By Me by Wendell Berry and Arthur Miller’s play All My Sons. See the full list here. 

Top picks for children exploring this year’s theme range from artist Carson Ellis’ whimsical picture-book Home with detailed illustrations of different homes across the world to Lemn Sissay’s Don’t Ask the Dragon, the story of a little boy called Alem looking for a home and E.L. Norry’s recently published book Runaways, about two 11-year-olds desperate to escape home. See the full list here. 

Author E.L. Norry said: "I'm absolutely thrilled that Runaways is included in this year's Reader anthology. To think my words will find their way into new Readers' groups, and hopefully their hearts, is very special.  

“Growing up in care and never quite feeling as if I had a home, the theme The Home We Carry certainly resonates with me. Over the years, I've often asked myself what home really means. I met my husband 29 years ago and soon felt that I was home whenever we were together.  

“But when I was younger, the books I read became my home, wherever I was. The characters I met between the pages became my friends. The different worlds I journeyed into helped me to articulate feelings and thoughts that were previously inexpressible. I read voraciously, curious to discover new ways of seeing things, and I was always rewarded with hope. As you read these pages, I'd like to say: 'Mi casa es su casa'. Enjoy!" 

The National Year of Reading sets out to encourage a love of books and reading to children from an early age. The number of children and young people in the UK now reading a book for pleasure has dropped to its lowest level in 20 years. The National Literacy Trust has revealed just one in three eight to 18-year‑olds enjoy reading in their spare time – a 36% reduction in two decades. 

The Reader Bookshelf was created to be ‘a string of guiding lights’ connecting more than 19,000 readers across the country each year. For more than 20 years, The Reader has been building a community of Shared Reading groups across the UK and around the world. In Shared Reading groups, trained volunteers read stories and poems aloud, and through the literature people connect and share experiences.   

FULL LIST: The Reader Bookshelf 2026: ‘The Home We Carry’

FOR ADULTS: 

Classic 

• Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan 

Play 

• All My Sons by Arthur Miller  

Non-fiction 

• Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer  

Short story collection 

• Stand by Me by Wendell Berry

Novels 

• Orbital by Samantha Harvey  

• Lila by Marylinne Robinson  

• Brotherless Night by VV Ganeshanathan  

• The Homemaker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher  

• Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi  

• How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn  

• Great Expectations by Charles Dickens  

• Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy  

FOR CHILDREN – a collection of picture books and stories: 

• Home by Carson Ellis 

• The Very Noisy House by Sally Nicholls & Gosia Herba 

• Don’t Ask the Dragon by Lemn Sissay & Greg Stobbs 

• The Blue Umbrella by Emily Ann Davison & Momoko Abe   

• King of the Sky by Nicola Davies & Laura Carlin 

• Heidi by Johanna Spyri 

• The Skull by Jon Klassen 

• Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery 

• The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame 

• Trash by Andy Mulligan 

• Glasgow Boys by Margaret Macdonald 

• Runaways by EL Norry 

6 Ways The Reader is Bringing the Bookshelf 2026 to Life: 

1. Shared Reading volunteers, group members and members of the public are invited to explore Bookshelf texts through a programme of literary events at The Reader’s home in the restored historic Mansion House in the heart of Calderstones Park including Deep Reads, wellbeing workshops, Reader Days, and author events. View What’s On here. 
2. Through a year-round programme of support events for volunteers includes a wealth of literary resources and draws on The Reader Bookshelf. The charity offers practical workshops to help volunteer Reader Leaders explore Bookshelf texts with their groups. 
3. Reader staff champion Bookshelf texts on the charity’s website and social media platforms with passionate written recommendations each month. 
4. Staff at The Storybarn, the charity’s multi-purpose on-site family space, actively recommend picture books and stories for younger children from the Reader Bookshelf to the 18,000+ people who visit each year. 
5. Via the beautiful Reader Bookshop at the charity’s headquarters, a destination for book lovers. Bookshelf texts are promoted in the shop in special displays and recommended to customers. 
6. Through collaborative partnerships, for example: 

Staff from Bath-based independent publishers, Persephone Books have previously visited Calderstones on several occasions for sold-out Shared Reading sessions of their titles featured on the Bookshelf. The 2026 list features another of their titles, The Home Maker by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. Watch this space. 

In 2025 The Reader collaborated with shopping centre Liverpool One, who purchased copies of the complete Reader Bookshelf. They displayed the books in specially created ‘reading corners’ for customers at several locations within the shopping centre. 

For further information or interview requests, please contact PR manager catherinevonledebur@thereader.org.uk or comms@thereader.org.uk