1969 – Something to Answer For by P. H. Newby, United Kingdom
1970 – The Elected Member by Bernice Rubens, United Kingdom
1970 – Troubles by J. G. Farrell, United Kingdom
1971 – In A Free State by V. S. Naipaul, United Kingdom / Trinidad and Tobago
1972 – G. by John Berger, United Kingdom
1973 – The Siege of Krishnapur by J. G. Farrell, United Kingdom
1974 – The Conservationist by Nadine Gordimer,South Africa, and Holiday by Stanley Middleton, United Kingdom
1975 – Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, United Kingdom / West Germany
1976 – Saville by David Storey, United Kingdom
1977 – Staying On by Paul Scott, United Kingdom
1978 – The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch, United Kingdom / Ireland
1979 – Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald, United Kingdom
1980 – Rites of Passage by William Golding, United Kingdom
1981 – Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie, United Kingdom / India
1982 – Schindler’s Ark by Thomas Keneally, Australia
1983 – Life & Times of Michael K. by J. M. Coetzee, South Africa
1984 – Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner, United Kingdom
1985 – The Bone People by Keri Hulme, New Zealand
1986 – The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis, United Kingdom
1987 – Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively, United Kingdom
1988 – Oscar and Lucinda by Peter Carey, Australia
1989 – The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro, United Kingdom / Japan
1990 – Possession: A Romance by A. S. Byatt, United Kingdom
1991 – The Famished Road by Ben Okri, Nigeria
1992 – The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, Canada / Sri Lanka, and Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth, United Kingdom
1993 – Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle, Ireland
1994 – How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman, United Kingdom
1995 – The Ghost Road by Pat Barker, United Kingdom
1996 – Last Orders by Graham Swift, United Kingdom
1997 – The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy, India
1998 – Amsterdam by Ian McEwan, United Kingdom
1999 – Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee, South Africa
2000 – The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood, Canada
2001 – True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey, Australia
2002 – Life of Pi by Yann Martel, Canada
2003 – Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre, Australia
2004 – The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst, United Kingdom
2005 – The Sea by John Banville, Ireland
2006 – The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai, India
2007 – The Gathering by Anne Enright, Ireland
2008 – The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga, India
2009 – Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel, United Kingdom
2010 – The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson, United Kingdom
2011 – The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes, United Kingdom
2012 – Bring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel, United Kingdom
2013 – The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton, New Zealand
2014 – The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan, Australia
2015 – A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James, Jamaica
2016 – The Sellout by Paul Beatty, United States
2017 – Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders, United States
2018 – Milkman by Anna Burns, United Kingdom / Northern Ireland
2019 – The Testaments by Margaret Atwood, Canada, and
2019 – Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo, United Kingdom
2020 – Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart, United Kingdom / Scotland
2021 – The Promise by Damon Galgut, South Africa
2022 – The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka, Sri Lanka
2023 – Prophet Song by Paul Lynch, Ireland
From The Recamier 