Sally Rooney's Books Pulled From the U.K. Over Royalty Donations to a Banned Group

Sally Rooney’s novels have quietly vanished from the U.K. market, and the reason has nothing to do with the writing. The author of Normal People pledged her book royalties to Palestine Action back in August 2025. The U.K. government had designated that group a terrorist organization a month earlier, which means anyone giving it money could face up to 14 years in prison under British law. That left her publisher, Faber&Faber, in a bind it couldn’t escape: pay Rooney, or risk breaking the law. Faber chose to stop publishing her in the U.K. entirely, and both sides describe the decision as mutual.

Here’s the part that makes it land harder. Rooney’s books reportedly account for about 10 percent of Faber’s revenue in years when she releases something new. That’s a huge chunk for a publisher to walk away from. But the pullback is strictly limited to the U.K. Readers in Ireland, the U.S., the Commonwealth, and everywhere else can still pick up her books without issue. Only British readers are locked out.

Underneath all of it is a question that goes way past one author: can a government effectively stop a book from being published by making it illegal to pay the person who wrote it? Palestine Action’s appeal against its ban heads to the U.K. Supreme Court next month, so this story is far from over. Where do you land on it? Is this a fair application of the law, or a step too far?