The UK government has designated 2026 as the National Year of Reading, and Stormzy is one of the faces behind a key initiative within it.

The Reading Agency’s Quick Reads programme, which distributes short, accessible books to non-readers, lapsed readers, and neurodivergent readers, has enlisted Stormzy’s #Merky Books imprint as a partner this year. Among the six new Quick Reads titles for 2026 is Hunger Pains by Derek Owusu, published through #Merky Books at Penguin Random House. The programme marks its 20th anniversary this year, having distributed more than five million books since its launch.

The urgency behind the initiative is hard to ignore. Nearly half of UK adults polled by The Reading Agency said they didn’t read. Quick Reads is designed to meet people where they are, through libraries, prisons, community groups, food banks, and charities. This year, for the first time, all titles will be available as audiobooks, and half a million copies will be gifted to UK prisons, also a first.

Stormzy, who has spoken openly about how books shaped him, said of the initiative: “Reading helped me when I was young and it still does today. Books have the power to carry you through life.” He founded #Merky Books in 2018 with an explicit mandate to platform underrepresented voices, and the imprint’s inclusion in Quick Reads keeps that mission in view. Derek Owusu, whose previous work includes That Reminds Me and Losing the Plot, is one of the most distinctive voices #Merky Books has championed.

For the Brittle Paper community, the story has a particular resonance. Leye Adenle Nigerian crime writer and author of the Amaka series, also features among this year’s Quick Reads authors. That two writers with African connections are part of a major UK literacy campaign speaks to a slow but real shift in who gets to fill the shelves that shape reading habits. The other titles in the 2026 Quick Reads lineup are by Rachel Hore, Rosie Goodwin, Louise Jensen, and Carmel Harrington.