It’s no prank: April is officially here and so are the spring-time books!
This month features some of my favorite debuts of the year, a deeply moving anthology about estrangement, and a book that turns history on its head. While the weather has been anything but consistent here in Chicago, there are glimpses of warmer days ahead. Here’s to April showers, future May flowers, and plenty of new releases to keep you entertained!
Wife Shaped Bodies
By Laura Cranehill
S&S/Saga Press
As a lover of literary horror, Wife Shaped Bodies absolutely floored me. In this captivating eco-fable, a newlywed covered in mushroom growths like the other wives in her community must balance her husband’s strict rules against the woman who makes her question everything. Laura Cranehill’s debut is a true triple threat—stunning in its lyricism, heartbreaking in the love and desire she brings to the page, and utterly visceral in its body horror. Let the weirdness wash over you in this undeniably enjoyable fever dream of a novel!
Day Care
By Nora Lange
Two Dollar Radio
Nora Lange follows up her dazzling debut novel Us Fools with Day Care, an electric short story collection that transforms the grotesqueries of modern life into comedy. Ranging from strange to surreal to simply laugh-out-loud funny, Lange’s stories offer a savage takedown on the lies we tell ourselves to get through the day. From two snow globe figurines coming to terms with the fact that they will never go anywhere to one of the most deliciously disastrous dinner parties ever put to paper, Day Care is the latest reminder that Nora Lange is an author to keep your eye on for years to come.
Last Night in Brooklyn
By Xochitl Gonzalez
Flatiron Books
In this novel about ambition, class, and the allures of money, twenty-six year old Alicia finds herself drawn into the lives of her wealthy banker cousin and an up-and-coming fashion designer, La Garza. With shades of The Great Gatsby and set during the lead-up to the 2008 presidential election, Last Night in Brooklyn explores the cost and compromise that comes with assimilation in the chase for “The American Dream.” Xochitl Gonzalez perfectly depicts this particular moment in American history.
Song for a Hard-Hit People: A Memoir of Antiracist Solidarity from a Coal Miner’s Daughter
By Beth Howard
Haymarket Books
The Appalachian region has long been mischaracterized in the American consciousness. In Song for a Hard-Hit People, organizer Beth Howard offers a powerful corrective through her own story of growing up in Kentucky. As Howard highlights the historical economic exploitation of the region and complexities of its people, she argues that the true key to fighting authoritarianism and billionaire oligarchs is through racial and class solidarity. Song for a Hard-Hit People is both a deeply personal ode to Howard’s home and a necessary roadmap for change in our communities and nation.
Fat Swim
By Emma Copley Eisenberg
Hogarth
From the author of House Mates comes a collection of linked short stories that highlight a fascinating cast of characters navigating their own bodies. In the title story, a young girl looks to a group of fat women at her local pool to teach her about her changing body. In “Swiffer Girl,” a woman trying for a baby with her partner is haunted by a viral sex video from high school. Emma Copley Eisenberg brings a fierce and funny voice to her stories, laying bare the complications of loving oneself in a hyper-judgemental society. Fat Swim is a fantastic new release from Eisenberg.
Les Portes
By Meredith Nnoka
Autumn House Press
In this deeply moving debut poetry collection, Meredith Nnoka ruptures the conventional domestic abuse narrative while offering a radical meditation on resistance and survival. With razor sharp language and careful attention to the complexities of abolition feminism, Les Portes is an encapsulating and illuminating work of poetry.
No Contact: Writers on Estrangement
Edited by Jenny Bartoy
Catapult
Sometimes we can’t even imagine how necessary a book is until we finally see it arrive into the world. In this new anthology edited by Jenny Bartoy, thirty-two writers offer deeply honest and reflective accounts on their estrangement from loved ones for myriad reasons, including abuse, politics, mental illness, and addiction. In turn, No Contact explores the idea of who we truly are without our family and the complex grief and healing that one can find in the aftermath. No Contact is radically vulnerable and truly soaring in its compassion, as well as a powerful reminder that we are never truly alone.
The Memory Museum
By M Lin
Graywolf Press
Spanning time and continents, M Lin’s exciting debut short story collection interrogates the disorientation of migration and the contradictions of living between cultures. In one story, an elderly woman in a dystopian reality is visited by forgotten memories of her grandfather’s village, while in another, four migrant workers and petty thieves forge a connection across one desperate night. Lin has created a kaleidoscopic collection that balances heart with a sharp eye for the problems of our time—from climate change and the aftermath of COVID to censorship and extreme wealth inequality. Mark The Memory Museum as a debut you don’t want to miss.
Fire and Clay: How Bricks Reveal the Hidden History of Chicago
By Will Quam
University of Chicago Press
Whether you’re a full Chicago nerd like me or a reader with a curiosity for history, Fire and Clay is an absolutely illuminating read. Will Quam, an architecture historian and founder of the award-winning walking tour Brick of Chicago, takes readers on a journey through Chicago’s past to highlight the ways the brick forever shaped the city and the world. Fire and Clay is a love letter to the materials that built Chicago and the countless stories they tell. This is a can’t-miss book for any serious history buff.
American Fantasy
By Emma Straub
Riverhead Books
Set aboard the American Fantasy cruise ship, the novel follows Annie, a newly divorced empty nester who finds herself on a four-day trip alongside five members of a famous nineties-era boy band and three thousand super fans. Straub brings a flair of absurdity and humanity to her latest release, making for a hilarious and undeniably entertaining read throughout. Come for the thrilling premise and leave with the satisfaction of having read a beautiful portrait of middle age liberation and reconnection.
The Infinite Sadness of Small Appliances
By Glenn Dixon
Atria Books
In the near future where even the smallest of appliances are sentient, a young Roomba vacuum listened to her owner, Harold, read to his dying wife, Edie. But when Edie passes away, the Roomba and her fellow appliances discover that the omnipresent monitor of all households known as the Grid intends to remove Harold from his home. Like The Brave Little Toaster mixed with a Black Mirror episode, Glenn Dixon’s new novel weaves together tenderness and incisive critique of our tech present and future to create a thrilling and compassionate story you won’t soon forget.
Mount Verity
By Therese Bohman
Translated by Marlaine Delargy
Other Press
On the night of Easter Eve 1989, a young boy and his friends go to Mount Verity, which is known by the locals as the site of the infamous witch trials during the 17th century in Sweden. When the boy disappears, his sister, Hanna, struggles to come to terms with what she’s lost and the life she built while her brother will never get to experience the same. This magical and grimly realistic story is a powerful ode to grief and the beauty in the natural world. Mount Verity is a dreamy, gripping slow-burn thriller.
