A friend of mine, a talented writer and photographer, is in Paris right now on a three-month artist’s residency. On this warm spring day, he reports, he is reading a book by John Berger in the Jardin des Tuileries, and the garden is “full of green chairs and people reading.” I mention this because it seems to me rather a perfect moment. It reminds me of a poem by Christina Rossetti, in which she reminds us “There is no time like Spring, When life’s alive in everything.”
Life is very much alive in bookshops, of course — especially in April. It’s the time of year when people are craving and welcoming new and inspiring things. With that in mind, here are some fresh book recommendations for the season of renewal and hope.
One book that immediately snagged my attention is all about Stephen King, his early novels, and what makes his writing “stick in our heads and haunt us long after” we’ve closed his books. It’s called Monsters in the Archive: My Year of Fear with Stephen King, and it’s written by scholar Caroline Bicks, the University of Maine’s inaugural Stephen E. King Chair in Literature (good gig, huh?). Bicks is the first scholar to have extended access to King’s personal archives in Bangor. With the author’s blessing, she studied his iconic early work — The Shining, Carrie, Pet Sematary, ‘Salem’s Lot, and Night Shift. In Monsters in the Archives, Bicks chronicles her insights into King’s writing process and personal history, and aims to show just how he crafted some of his best and scariest fiction. This delicious book — a treat for fans of Stephen King, as well as a fascinating peek behind the curtain — is out April 21.
My next recommendation is Surrender by Jennifer Acker, a quirky-sounding novel about a woman who leaves a successful career in New York to save her family’s goat farm. The basic premise sounds precisely up my alley. But the book gets more compelling, of course. At 47, as she acclimates to life as a goat farmer, Lucy Richard is struggling with a collapsing marriage, an ailing father, and financial troubles. When she discovers a newfound intimacy with a childhood friend, Sandy, her course changes even more dramatically. Richard Russo, a favourite author of mine, says that Acker’s novel “provides what I crave from all stories: vividly drawn characters worth spending time with and a richly rendered place for them to inhabit.” Splendid! I’m down for that. You might be too. Look for the book with pink goats on the cover.
A new book from the beloved Irish writer Colm Tóibín is always cause to rejoice, and we have one to celebrate in April (its official publication date is March 31). A collection of nine short stories, set across Ireland, Spain, and America, The News from Dublin covers familiar terrain for Tóibín: family, longing, loss, and love. The News from Dublin, the author’s third story collection, is sure to be the perfect introduction to his short fiction. He truly is one of the finest writers of his generation. Don’t miss this one.
Normally, you don’t hear much about début poetry collections — which is unfortunate — but there’s one out in April I’d like to call attention to: Camilla Gibb’s I Used to Be a Pisces. Gibb is widely known for her award-winning, internationally acclaimed novels: Mouthing the Words, The Petty Details of So-and-so’s Life, Sweetness in the Belly, The Beauty of the Humanity Movement, and The Relatives. Her profoundly moving memoir, This Is Happy, was a finalist for the RBC Taylor Prize. It is one of the most insightful, wise, humane examinations of grief I’ve ever read. It’s also beautiful in its exploration of love, happiness, and family.
I Used to Be a Pisces is a deeply felt meditation on love and belonging, a collection of poems that examine our relationships to the earth and one another. Gibb’s poems are accompanied by her original collage work. Advanced praise for the book is glowing. “Camilla Gibb’s début collection reveals that poetry lies at the core of her celebrated and widely known works of fiction and memoir,” writes former Poet Laureate of Toronto, A.F. Moritz. “Brilliant in form and relevant to us all, I Used to Be a Pisces is a beautiful and outstanding book.” I can’t wait to read this. It hits bookstore shelves on April 1.
And, as it happens, April is National Poetry Month in Canada. Fittingly, there are a number of swoon-worthy new poetry collections soon to drop, including The Wren by A.F. Moritz (his twenty-third book of poems!), Yield by Nova Scotian poet Jaime Forsythe, Gold Star by Emma McKenna, Kathryn MacDonald’s The Blue Gate, and Calling It Back to Me by Laurie D. Graham. There are more, so maybe this April have a gander at all the poetry titles in your local bookshop. Most indie bookshops have a fine Poetry section. And the great thing about indie booksellers is they are always happy to special order a book for you; just name it, they’ll bring it in. Save the date, too! Saturday, April 25 is Independent Bookstore Day in Canada — the perfect day to get out and support our local independent booksellers.
Now, if you’re looking to really give your imagination a good Spring workout, you may wish to pick up my Mind-Bending Book of the Month recommendation: the fantastically-titled The Infinite Sadness of Small Appliances, a daring, playful novel by Glenn Dixon. This book’s plot sounds timely and spectacularly mischievous — in the near future, a sentient robot vacuum renames herself Scout (because it hears its owner, Harold, reading To Kill a Mockingbird to his dying wife), after learning that The Grid, the power that oversees every house in the city, plans to remove Harold from his home of 50 years. This upsets Scout, and she mobilizes a ragtag group of humans and appliances to help stop the sinister forces at play. Want to cheer on a loyal vacuum robot? The Infinite Sadness of Small Appliances is the book for you!
Happy reading, friends. And happy Spring!