The Best Book Club Books of April

Here, Henry is giving us writers-turned-lovers like she has before, but with a twist. The writers in question are Alice Scott, the sunshiney writer hungry for that big break, and Hayden Anderson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning grouch. The two are on an island called Little Crescent because they’re both vying to write the biography of the legendary Margaret Ives—an 80-something-year-old heiress and former tabloid princess who hasn’t been seen in years. The twist comes in the form of them both being given a one-month trial period for Margaret to see who she likes best to write her story. Thing is, she’s not actually telling them everything, and depending who’s telling her story, it could appear to be a tragedy or an homage to love. What’s more, the developing tension between the two writers is turning into its own narrative.

Jerkins’ (Caul Baby) latest has this vital duality. It’s about the lasting consequences of slavery, just as it is about the power of love. It’s 1865, and Harrison has been discharged from the Union Army as a free man, so he tries to reunite with his love, Tirzah. His plans get rearranged, though, after he settles with another woman after a tragedy. Then there’s Tirzah, who teaches at the Freedman’s School. She sees an ad in the paper looking for her and knows it’s Harrison looking for her, but the state of the world, despite her new freedom, means reuniting with him is full of risk. Jerkins’ narrative sweeps over generations, and 150 years later, in 2019 Harlem, Ardelia and Oliver are hosting their engagement party, and he gives her a crumbling, aged love letter. The question of whether their connection was some sort of cosmic reconciliation, started generations ago, arises.

This chronicles the very deliberate effort to destroy First Nations communities and cultures by way of cultural genocide. From the mid-1800s to the late 1930s, tens of thousands of Indigenous American children were stolen from their families and forced to go to boarding schools that were sponsored by the US government—and which had virtually no regulation. At the schools, they were abused and discouraged from engaging in their traditions and culture through violence. Ojibwe journalist Mary Pember explores the long-term ramifications of attending these loveless institutions, detailing how her mother, having attended one, set the stage for a fraught mother-daughter dynamic.

This has been likened to the historical fiction of writers like Hilary Mantel and Maggie O’Farrell, and I have to say that I can see it reaching the level of popularity and acclaim that books by those authors did—at least partially because it’s so messy.

So let’s get to the mess: in 1480, John Collan is attending to his peasant duties (which involve a goat) when he’s approached by a well-dressed stranger who tells him that his whole life has been a lie. He’s not John at all, but Lambert Simnel, son of the long-dead Duke of Clarence, and sent away because the Duke’s brother, Richard III, liked to unalive his nephews. Well, now that his true identity has been revealed, John-now-Simnel is sent to court in Ireland, learns etiquette, and even meets the delightfully manipulative—and occasionally murderous—Joan, the daughter of his Irish patrons. In a way, the two aren’t so different—she can either go to the convent or to the wedding altar, and he can be king or die. That’s why they come together to plot and scheme, changing the course of England forever.

Yes, I am very excited for this queer, 1910s New York City-set romance and its Shape of Water essence. In it, Benny Caldera should really be labeled as an artist for the stunning ironwork tank he makes for the Coney Island playground, even if orphaned Boricua blacksmiths usually aren’t. But more awe-inspiring than his tank is the merman who comes to occupy it in captivity. Benny comes to know the merman—Río—as a kindred spirit captured from the East River, and soon the deep love that develops has him questioning his ideas around captivity and what he will sacrifice for the sake of the one he loves.

Bertie is a trans man who spends his nights with his friends living it up in Berlin’s poppin’ queer scene. Then Hitler comes, and the Institute of Sexual Science, where Bertie works to improve the lives of queer people in Germany, gets raided and he barely escapes with his girlfriend Sofie. For more than 10 years, they live as an elderly couple on a farm in isolation, until they see a young trans man on their property. He’s passed out and still in Holocaust prison clothes. They decide to protect him, most of all from the Allied forces who are arresting queer prisoners while freeing everyone else. In an ironic twist, as the Allied forces grow stronger, Bertie and his family start to think they may actually be safer in the US.

There have been so many deliciously dark thrillers coming out lately that look at social media and influencer life, and this is the latest. Mega-popular influencer Chloe VanHuusen makes a video where she finds her long-lost twin and buys her a house…for the views, obvi. Then, Julie Chan, the twin and a supermarket cashier with not a lot going for her, finds her twin sister dead and decides to step into her life and have everything she could have ever wanted. This means designer clothes, a bomb skincare routine, and millions of followers. It also means struggling to fit into Chloe’s social circle and attending a weeklong island retreat where things get out of control, and Julie uncovers the dark forces that led to her twin’s death. Forces that may target her next.