Four new novels to read in April

From a multi-layered love story to a TV series in the making

Is there any greater joy than planning your holiday reading? I ask because as I write this, it is another cold, grey day in London - but by the time you read it, I will be a 12 hour flight away, lying on a beach, head in a book (sorry). And I think curating the selection of reads that I’m packing has brought me almost as much happiness as the excitement for the trip itself has.

I wrote more about holiday reads last summer - but in the meantime please enjoy these stellar new novels publishing this month; great for adventures and dreary days at home alike.

Go As a River by Shelley Read

I often get nervous when publishers tell you a new novel is like [insert enormously successful book here], but in this case, ‘for fans of Where the Crawdads Sing’ is entirely fair. Go As A River is a stunning book, and one so engrossing I read it in two days. If it doesn’t become a huge hit (and spurn a film adaptation), I will be shocked.

It tells the story of Victoria Nash, who is growing up in a tiny village in 1940s Colorado. She is just 17 when she crosses paths with a young man who will change the course of her life. Within months, she will be running far from home to fend for herself. This book is a beautifully written, heartbreaking tale about forbidden love, nature (the landscape is a character in itself), resilience and coming of age.

Rosewater by Liv Little

Elsie is a 28-year-old living in South London, whose dream is to become a professional poet. Instead, she struggles to make ends meet from her job in the neighbourhood gay bar (and keeps finding herself in bed with her colleague Bea).

When Elsie gets evicted from her home, there is only one person she can call: her former best friend Juliet, who she has known since her childhood. Thus begins a gorgeous, multi-layered love story; the kind you stay up late to read.

Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld

Romantic Comedy needs to come with a pre-warning: read it in public at your peril, as there were multiple times I looked like a total weirdo trying to stifle laughter. The witticism comes from our narrator Sally, a writer working on a late night show. When her male colleague becomes yet another Average Joe dating a successful, glamourous woman, she comes up with a sketch about how the same situation never happens in reverse.

Then the handsome, megastar musician Noah walks into the studio as the show’s next guest presenter - and her theory begins to get tested. Romantic Comedy is joyful, poignant, smart, fast-paced, and did I mention funny?

Pineapple Street by Jenny Jackson

Pineapple Street is about money and wealth and family and marriage, and it is so zingy and fun that I am entirely not surprised that it’s already being made into a HBO series.

It centres on three Brooklyn-based women. Darley is a mother wondering if she should have given up her career, Georgiana is her younger sister getting into a romantic entanglement at work, and Sasha is their sister in-law who’s living in their former family home and getting called ‘the GD’ (gold-digger) behind her back. Their lives, parties, and relationships make for pure, escapist bliss.

And finally…

I had to share my love for this, a vending machine that dispenses books. Genius!

Penguin Books UK @PenguinUKBooks

Introducing... the Penguin Book Vending Machine! In 1935, Sir Allen Lane was inspired to create Penguin Books when he couldn't find a good book to read at Exeter St. David's train station. We've gone back to our roots to ensure modern day commuters won't face the same problem.