Sally Rooney says her books can no longer be sold in the UK

Sally Rooney says her books can no longer be sold in the UK after she pledged the royalties to a banned pro-Palestinian group.

The Irish author made the announcement herself. Her books, she said, can no longer be sold in Britain, a consequence that follows directly from her decision to donate royalties to Palestinian Action, a group that has been banned.

Rooney is the author of Normal People, Conversations with Friends and Beautiful World, Where Are You. No further titles, sales figures or publisher statements appear in the report, so the exact mechanics of the withdrawal — whether it covers print, digital, or remaining stock — rest on her own account.

What does this change for readers?

The practical question is simple: can you still buy a Rooney novel in Britain? According to the author's own statement, no. Her books "can no longer be sold in the UK," she said, after she pledged the royalties to the banned group.

That's the strongest fact in the story, and it comes straight from Rooney. The report doesn't quote a publisher, a retailer or a government body confirming the arrangement, so her statement is the sole source for both the pledge and the commercial consequence.

The mechanism, as far as it goes

The sequence, as Rooney describes it, runs in three steps:

• She pledged the royalties from her books to a pro-Palestinian group.
• That group, Palestinian Action, has been banned.
• As a result, she says, her books can no longer be sold in the UK.

The report does not specify which law, retailer decision or distribution arrangement produced step three. What it establishes is the author's account: a royalty pledge tied to a banned organization, and a resulting end to UK sales.

For a writer of Rooney's commercial standing — her novels have been bestsellers and Normal People became a television adaptation — a voluntary or forced exit from the UK market is a rare move. It puts a political commitment ahead of one of her largest English-language readerships.

Whether other authors follow the same route, or whether UK sellers and publishers respond, will determine whether this stays a single author's stance or the first case in a broader pattern.