The 34 Best Translated Novels of the 2020s

Translators carried a lot this decade, bringing prize-winners out of Hindi, Bulgarian, Catalan and Korean alongside cozy bookshop bestsellers. Some arrived with major awards attached; others found readers through word of mouth.

1. 1
   When We Cease to Understand the World

   Benjamín Labatut's fictionalised portraits of scientists such as Haber, Heisenberg and Schrödinger, translated from Spanish by Adrian Nathan West.
   1000pts
2. 2
   Days at the Morisaki Bookshop

   Satoshi Yagisawa's Japanese novel about a young woman living above her uncle's secondhand bookshop in Tokyo's Jimbocho, translated by Eric Ozawa.
   942pts
3. 3
   Breasts and Eggs

   Mieko Kawakami's novel about three women in Osaka and Tokyo, translated from Japanese by Sam Bett and David Boyd and published in English in 2020.
   826pts
4. 4
   Heaven

   Mieko Kawakami's novel about a bullied 14-year-old boy and his friendship with a classmate, translated from Japanese by Sam Bett and David Boyd.
   826pts
5. 5
   Still Born

   Guadalupe Nettel's Mexican novel about two friends facing opposite choices about motherhood, translated from Spanish by Rosalind Harvey and shortlisted for the 2023 International Booker.
   753pts
6. 6
   At Night All Blood Is Black

   David Diop's French novel about a Senegalese soldier in the First World War, translated by Anna Moschovakis; it won the 2021 International Booker Prize.
   668pts
7. 7
   Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982

   Cho Nam-joo's Korean bestseller about the everyday sexism faced by an ordinary woman, translated by Jamie Chang and published in English in 2020.
   668pts
8. 8
   Our Share of Night

   Mariana Enríquez's Argentine horror novel about a father and son bound to an occult Order, translated from Spanish by Megan McDowell.
   668pts
9. 9
   The Employees

   Olga Ravn's Danish novel told through staff statements aboard a spaceship, translated by Martin Aitken and shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker.
   667pts
10. 10
    Butter

    Asako Yuzuki's Japanese novel about a journalist interviewing a gourmet cook accused of killing several men, translated by Polly Barton.
    667pts
11. 11
    Greek Lessons

    Han Kang's Korean novel about a woman who has lost her voice and her Greek teacher who is losing his sight, translated by Deborah Smith and Emily Yae Won.
    667pts
12. 12
    Elena Knows

    Claudia Piñeiro's Argentine novel about a woman with Parkinson's disease investigating her daughter's death, translated from Spanish by Frances Riddle.
    565pts
13. 13
    Scattered All Over the Earth

    Yoko Tawada's novel about a woman whose homeland, Japan, has vanished, translated by Margaret Mitsutani and a finalist for the 2022 National Book Award for Translated Literature.
    565pts
14. 14
    Boulder

    Eva Baltasar's novel about a ship's cook drawn into motherhood with her partner in Iceland, translated from Catalan by Julia Sanches and shortlisted for the 2023 International Booker.
    565pts
15. 15
    Kairos

    Jenny Erpenbeck's German novel about an affair in 1980s East Berlin, translated by Michael Hofmann; it won the 2024 International Booker Prize.
    565pts
16. 16
    The Anomaly

    Hervé Le Tellier's Prix Goncourt-winning novel about the passengers of an Air France flight who land twice, translated from French by Adriana Hunter.
    565pts
17. 17
    Crooked Plow

    Itamar Vieira Junior's Brazilian novel about two sisters on a Bahia plantation, translated from Portuguese by Johnny Lorenz and shortlisted for the 2024 International Booker.
    565pts
18. 18
    Hurricane Season

    Fernanda Melchor's Mexican novel about the murder of a village witch, translated from Spanish by Sophie Hughes and shortlisted for the 2020 International Booker.
    439pts
19. 19
    Winter in Sokcho

    Elisa Shua Dusapin's French novel set in a South Korean seaside town, translated by Aneesa Abbas Higgins; it won the 2021 National Book Award for Translated Literature.
    439pts
20. 20
    The Books of Jacob

    Olga Tokarczuk's Polish epic about the 18th-century messianic leader Jacob Frank, translated by Jennifer Croft.
    439pts
21. 21
    The Words That Remain

    Stênio Gardel's Brazilian novel about an elderly man who learns to read a letter from his first love, translated by Bruna Dantas Lobato; it won the 2023 National Book Award for Translated Literature.
    439pts
22. 22
    Taiwan Travelogue

    Yáng Shuāng-zǐ's Mandarin novel about a Japanese writer and her Taiwanese interpreter in the 1930s, translated by Lin King; it won the 2024 National Book Award for Translated Literature and the 2026 International Booker.
    439pts
23. 23
    Not a River

    Selva Almada's Argentine novel about three men on a fishing trip, translated from Spanish by Annie McDermott and shortlisted for the 2024 International Booker.
    439pts
24. 24
    We Do Not Part

    Han Kang's Korean novel about the 1948 Jeju massacres, translated by e. yaewon and Paige Aniyah Morris and published in English in 2025.
    439pts
25. 25
    Solenoid

    Mircea Cărtărescu's sprawling Romanian novel narrated by a Bucharest schoolteacher, translated by Sean Cotter.
    439pts
26. 26
    On the Calculation of Volume I

    The first book of Solvej Balle's Danish series about a woman trapped in a repeating 18 November, translated by Barbara J. Haveland and shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker.
    439pts
27. 27
    A New Name: Septology VI–VII

    The closing volume of Jon Fosse's Septology, translated from Norwegian by Damion Searls and shortlisted for the 2022 International Booker.
    439pts
28. 28
    We Are Green and Trembling

    Gabriela Cabezón Cámara's Argentine novel about the 17th-century soldier Antonio de Erauso fleeing into the South American jungle, translated by Robin Myers; it won the 2025 National Book Award for Translated Literature.
    439pts
29. 29
    Tender Is the Flesh

    Agustina Bazterrica's Argentine dystopia in which humans are farmed for meat, translated from Spanish by Sarah Moses.
    0pts
30. 30
    Minor Detail

    Adania Shibli's Arabic novel linking a 1949 crime in the Negev to a Ramallah woman's search decades later, translated by Elisabeth Jaquette.
    0pts
31. 31
    Tomb of Sand

    Geetanjali Shree's Hindi novel about an 80-year-old widow travelling to Pakistan, translated by Daisy Rockwell; it won the 2022 International Booker Prize.
    0pts
32. 32
    Love in the Big City

    Sang Young Park's Korean novel following a gay man's life and loves in Seoul, translated by Anton Hur.
    0pts
33. 33
    The Discomfort of Evening

    Marieke Lucas Rijneveld's Dutch novel about a grieving farm family, translated by Michele Hutchison; it won the 2020 International Booker Prize.
    0pts
34. 34
    Time Shelter

    Georgi Gospodinov's Bulgarian novel about a clinic that recreates past decades for people with Alzheimer's, translated by Angela Rodel; it won the 2023 International Booker Prize.
    0pts

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