The oddsmaker is betting that Patrick Radden Keefe will make history as the first author to win the award twice.

By Andrew Richard Albanese, Editor-in-Chief

William Hill, the world’s largest bookmaker, has released odds on all six shortlisted titles for the 2026 Baillie Gifford Prize for Nonfiction, with Patrick Radden Keefe’s London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City, and a Family’s Search for Truth leading the pack at 9/4.

The Baillie Gifford Prize is open to books on any subject and to writers of any nationality, published in any language, anywhere in the world, provided they are published in English in the U.K. during the year of entry. The winning author receives £50,000, with translators sharing the prize in the case of translated works. The winner will be announced at an awards ceremony on Wednesday, November 4, at an award ceremony at BMA House, supported by the Blavatnik Family Foundation. The announcement will also be livestreamed across the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction social channels.

The 2026 shortlist, drawn from over 350 eligible books published between November 2025 and October 2026, includes:

• Baldwin: A Love Story by Nicholas Boggs (Bloomsbury Circus, Bloomsbury Publishing).
• Days of Love and Rage: A Story of Revolution by Anand Gopal (Pluto Press).
• London Falling: A Mysterious Death in a Gilded City and a Family’s Search for Truth by Patrick Radden Keefe (Picador, Pan Macmillan).
• Alexander: God, King, Man by Edmund Richardson (Bloomsbury Publishing).
• The Great Dictator: A Life of Barbara Cartland by Matthew Sweet (Hodder & Stoughton).
• The Traveller: The Revolutionary Life of George Forster and his Search for Humanity by Andrea Wulf (Allen Lane, Penguin Press).

The shortlist of six books were chosen by this year’s judging panel: Kirsty Lang, broadcaster and arts journalist (chair); head of books at Waterstones, Bea Carvalho; writer and cultural historian Dr. Tiffany Jenkins; literary editor of The Spectator, Sam Leith; editor and reporter, Ravi Mattu; and award-winning novelist and storyteller, Elif Shafak.

Keefe, who won the prize in 2021 for Empire of Pain, returns to the shortlist for a second time—and a second win would see him make prize history as the first author to claim the award twice.

According to William Hill, after Keefe, the favorites are Nicholas Boggs and Andrea Wulf, both at 3/1. Anand Gopal follows at 5/1; while Edmund Richardson and Matthew Sweet are both priced at 6/1.