Launched in 1996, the prize celebrates excellence, originality and accessibility in women's writing from throughout the world. The winner will receive a cheque for £30,000 and a limited edition bronze figurine known as a 'Bessie', created and donated by the artist Grizel Niven. Both are anonymously endowed.
The Lacuna
Barbara Kingsolver
The Very Thought of You
Rosie Alison
Black Water Rising
Attica Locke
Wolf Hall
Hilary Mantel
A Gate at the Stairs
Lorrie Moore
The White Woman on the Green Bicycle
Monique Roffey
Home
Marilynne Robinson
Scottsboro
Ellen Feldman
The Wilderness
Samantha Harvey
The Invention of Everything Else
Samantha Hunt
Molly Fox's Birthday
Deirdre Madden
Burnt Shadows
Kamila Shamsie
The Road Home
Rose Tremain
Fault Lines
Nancy Huston
The Outcast
Sadie Jones
When We Were Bad
Charlotte Mendelson
Lullabies for Little Criminals
Heather O'Neill
Lottery
Patricia Wood
Half of a Yellow Sun
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Arlington Park
Rachel Cusk
The Inheritance of Loss
Kiran Desai
A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers
Xiaolu Guo
The Observations
Jane Harris
Digging to America
Anne Tyler
On Beauty
Zadie Smith
The History of Love
Nicole Krauss
Beyond Black
Hilary Mantel
The Accidental
Ali Smith
Everyman's Rules for Scientific Living
Carrie Tiffany
The Night Watch
Sarah Waters
We Need to Talk About Kevin
Lionel Shriver
Billy Morgan
Jools Denby
Old Filth
Jane Gardam
The Mammoth Cheese
Sheri Holman
Liars and Saints
Maile Meloy
A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian
Marina Lewycka
Small Island
Andrea Levy
Purple Hibiscus
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Oryx and Crake
Margaret Atwood
The Great Fire
Shirley Hazzard
Ice Road
Gillian Slovo
The Colour
Rose Tremain
Property
Valerie Martin
Buddha Da
Anne Donovan
Heligoland
Shena Mackay
Unless
Carol Shields
The Autograph Man
Zadie Smith
The Little Friend
Donna Tartt
Bel Canto
Ann Patchett
No Bones
Anna Burns
The Siege
Helen Dunmore
The White Family
Maggie Gee
A Child's Book of True Crime
Chloe Hooper
Fingersmith
Sarah Waters
The Idea of Perfection
Kate Grenville
The Blind Assassin
Margaret Atwood
Fred & Edie
Jill Dawson
Hotel World
Ali Smith
Homestead
Rosina Lippi
Horse Heaven
Jane Smiley
When I Lived in Modern Times
Linda Grant
If I Told You Once
Judy Budnitz
Amy and Isabelle
Elizabeth Strout
The Dancers Dancing
Eilis Ni Dhuibhne
White Teeth
Zadie Smith
Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
Rebecca Wells
A Crime in the Neighbourhood
Suzanne Berne
The Short History of a Prince
Jane Hamilton
The Poisonwood Bible
Barbara Kingsolver
Paradise
Toni Morrison
The Leper's Companions
Julia Blackburn
Visible Worlds
Marilyn Bowering
Larry's Party
Carol Shields
Lives of the Monster Dogs
Kirsten Bakis
The Ventriloquist's Tale
Pauline Melville
The Magician's Assistant
Ann Patchett
Love Like Hate Adore
Deirdre Purcell
The Weight of Water
Anita Shreve
Fugitive Pieces
Anne Michaels
Alias Grace
Margaret Atwood
One by One in the Darkness
Deirdre Madden
I Was Amelia Earhart
Jane Mendelsohn
Accordion Crimes
E Annie Proulx
Hen's Teeth
Manda Scott
A Spell of Winter
Helen Dunmore
The Book of Colour
Julia Blackburn
Spinsters
Pagan Kennedy
The Hundred Secret Senses
Amy Tan
Ladder of Years
Anne Tyler
Eveless Eden
Marianne Wiggins