Credit: Conor Horgan 2025
Profile
Djamel White
Djamel White is a writer from Dublin, Ireland. He holds an MFA from University College Dublin and is the recipient of a Literature Bursary Award and an Agility Award from the Arts Council of Ireland. His debut novel, All Them Dogs was longlisted for the 2026 Booker Prize
ALL THEM DOGS
longlisted for the booker prize
A young Irish gangster is caught in a brutal dance between desire and loyaltyTony Ward is back in Dublin. After five years in England, where he fled after murdering a rival gang member, he returns to find that his mentor is dead and his best friend has gone straight.Keen to reestablish himself, he jumps at the chance to work for the enforcer of a local crime boss. But Flute Walsh is a far cry from the boy Tony once knew. Drawn to Flute in ways he never expected, Tony finds that the boundaries he thought he understood are breaking down in a world where nothing stays buried and where retribution is just a bullet away.By turns savage, erotic, and unexpectedly tender, All Them Dogs is a gripping story of violence, lust, and greed that explores one man’s struggles to find balance in an unsparing world.
What the booker judges are saying:
"...a mouthy, ballsy and bracingly unsentimental portrait of West Dublin gangland, set well off the beaten track of the city’s usual literary landmarks. It charts the lives, loyalties and dealings of a semi-organised crime world. Yet, the novel’s real achievement lies in something quieter and more easily overlooked beneath the bullets and bone-breaking dramatics: a subtle, textured humanity woven among the violent hyper-masculine protagonists.White is an impressive stylist. He has an ear for dialogue that is both racy and real, and a gift for atmospheric description that feels at once inventive and classically grounded. This writer understands that the vernacular of the street, handled with precision and care, can carry as much emotional and literary weight as any elevated register"
MORE PRAISE FOR ALL THEM DOGS
"In the best Irish style, Djamel White uses a local voice to blast through language and make it new. His hero, Tony Ward, is a bittersweet confection of self-defeating swagger and All Them Dogs is a stylish, adroit and gritty debut"– Anne Enright, author of the booker prize winning the gathering
“All Them Dogs is a claustrophobic masterpiece—an emotionally devastating literary crime novel set in Dublin's underworld, where violence, poverty, and toxic masculinity form a brutal backdrop to a brilliantly tender love story. Here is an intimate tale of violence and desire that is as sharp as the knives wielded on the page. Djamel White has taken a familiar genre and turned it into something bright and new, burning like white phosphorus.” – Isaac Fitzgerald, New York Times bestselling author of Dirtbag, Massachusetts
“ALL THEM DOGS is as compelling as your favorite gangster movie, as profound as your favorite novel. So sexy and tender and dangerous and poetic and frightening.” – August Thompson, author of ANYONE’S GHOST
“All Them Dogs is all that— a book you inhale, devour, grapple with, and reel from more than read. A coming-of-age novel for an age that comes breathing down the back of your neck. The kind of book where everything is on the edge of a knife and where love, like death, is either a kiss or a bullet away." – Marlon James, author of the Booker Prize-winning A Brief History of Seven Killings
"Exhilarating and often frightening - Djamel White’s first novel is a hugely satisfying read. It adds new streets to Dublin’s literary map." – Roddy Doyle, Author of the booker prize winning Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha