I know that technically Easter will have passed by the time it’s April this year (by one day), but that’s not normal, so it’s no wonder I missed it when I was writing the What to Read in March blog. I suppose it doesn’t matter much, anyway, as I have almost no books to recommend for Easter reading at this point in my own history. I believe I will, someday. Even so, since it’s like two days before Easter right now, I’ll give you my only two recommendations, which are children’s books.

The first of those children’s books is the nonreligious of the two. Junie B., First Grader: Dumb Bunny by Barbara Park is part of the Junie B. Jones series of elementary-level (easy reader) chapter books. I like Junie, as did my daughter when she was that age. I have not yet reviewed the Junie B. series, but she’s a slightly more modern take on a Ramona Quimby, with soft writing and a lot of spunk. In this book, she’s struggling with feeling bad about herself. The second recommendation is The Berenstain Bears and the Easter Story, which is a religious picture book. It is by Jan and Mike Berenstain, after Stan had died. I do like the original ones better, maybe just because they are the originals, but the production has at least stayed in the family (I think). I also have not reviewed the Berenstain Bears yet, but it is a very large series of simple picture books with moral lessons that I grew up on (my sister was a huge fan) and then I read to both my kids. Again, they are very gentle, I suppose with less spunk than Junie B.

I will recommend some poetry, though, which I have read reviewed plenty of, for poetry month:

How to Eat a Poem, The American Poetry & Literacy PoetryBrand New Ancients, Kae TempestAsphodel & Other Love Poems, William Carlos WilliamsGlass, Irony and God, Ann CarsonSpinning the Vast Fantastic, Britton Shurley

Some of my favorite poems include “The Jabberwocky” from Through the Looking Glass (Lewis Caroll); “Aedh Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven” (William Butler Yeats); “Kingdom Animalia” (Aracelis Girmay); “A Song in the Front Yard” (Gwendolyn Brooks); “The Afterlife” (Billy Collins); “Falling” (James Dickey);  and “The Long Boat” (Stanley Kunitz). Some of my favorite poets are represented there, too, but I also love Shakespeare and Browning and good, ol’ fashioned, poetry anthologies like The Norton Anthology of Poetry or The Oxford Book of Twentieth Century English Verse.

One of these years I will actually read Ben-Hur for Easter (by Lew Wallace) and then, maybe, I will have something to recommend for Easter. The Easter reading list I have in my back pocket is pretty darn small (any recommendations?); even so, I cannot seem to get through this first one. I have started it. Twice. But it is old fashioned and slow. Perhaps the problem is how busy I tend to get this time of year. This year, I doubt very much I will get to it because of a shelf-full of book club reads. (This is the year of the book club, in case you didn’t know.) But yes, Ben-Hur is an Easter novel, and a religious one at that. It actually begins at the Christian Christmas story, but the majority of the story is related to Jesus’s final week (holy week) and one of his Roman converts.

As for much-anticipated publications, we have some exciting ones this month and perhaps you should start thinking about your summer reading (or Spring Break reading, but that’s probably over for you as it is for me).

First, because I love her, is Leigh Bardugo and The Familiar. I have not read Hell Bent, and this is the third book of hers that has left the Grishaverse for a creepier, more real setting, the first one that is a standalone. I will be reading all of these books, eventually, because Bardugo is a master of YA fantasy. Whereas Ninth House and Hell Bent took place in a modern boarding school, The Familiar is Bardugo’s first historical fantasy (YA) and takes place during the Spanish Inquisition (and the protagonist is both magical and Jewish). It seems like everyone is looking forward to this one.All romance readers are also looking forward to Funny Story by Emily Henry, which will probably be this year’s ultimate beach read. I mean, Henry has a previous novel actually named Beach Read , and she has proven to be a giant of the genre. She cranks out one per year and I haven’t yet caught up with Happy Place because I was waiting for the paperback—and an actual vacation. So I’m sure I’ll read that one this summer and, perhaps, Funny People as well. While I’m not a huge romance reader, I do read the most promising titles in the genre, and Emily Henry is my favorite (at least in the non-YA realm). She definitely delivers on the sizzle and sparks and keeping it lighthearted.Speaking of YA, we have mere days before Holly Jackson’s newest will be on the shelf at your local bookstore. An excellent writer in the thriller/crime YA vein, The Reappearance of Rachel Price leaves behind the Good Girl’s Guide to Murder trilogy (which is complete) for the story of one girl whose mother disappeared when she was little… only to reappear during the filming of a true crime documentary. But Bel is not at all sure about her mom or the truth of anything she’s being told. I would say we’ have some’re guaranteed some good twists, here.From the author of The Devil in the White City, we have a new history book titled The Demon of Unrest. The Devil is on my bookshelf and I will definitely be reading it, but this new Erik Larson book looks, well, not only interesting but also timely (released at the end of April, during an election year which will be riddled with talk about partisanship and threats to democracy). It takes place between Abraham Lincoln’s election to the presidency, and the beginning of the Civil War with the crisis at Fort Sumter. (Okay, I know very little about what I’m saying here.) Larson uses historical documentation to give us real people who show up in all their conflicted, complicated glory. So I hear.And another title in the nonfiction arena, we have The Age of Magical Overthinking by Amanda Montell. I have not read her popular Cultish or Wordslut, but I am intrigued by this one because of the topic. The premise is that our brains are overloaded at this point in time and place and our coping mechanisms are dialed up so high that our magical thinking—believe and it will be so—is being way overutilized. Since she apparently writes such interesting nonfiction, cultural explorations, it’s definitely a book I would read and probably will.

Because of the last book I mentioned—The Age of Magical Overthinking—I am going to recommend a book I have been meaning to read, The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, for obvious reasons (ahem, the title). It won the National Book Award in 2005 and I often heard it referred to. It is a memoir which takes place during a time in Didion’s life when everything was upended by the illness and death of those closest to her. It doesn’t actually have anything to do with magical thinking. It is about the grieving of a literary great, and in that way has a connection to writing. There are definitely people who hate this book, but I’m looking forward to reading it myself, hoping that I’ll feel the way about it that majority of the critics did.

I have an extra-full month for book club reads because two of the clubs moved their meetings to the beginning of April from the end of March. Therefore, there are more titles here than book clubs I am currently in. Not that that diminishes how crazy I am to be in as many as I am. Here is what I will be reading this month for the various book clubs, in order of due dates:

I am currently reading Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange. It was just published this past month and I don’t know if a book could be more talked about, at least in the bookish world. Orange’s first book, There, There , came out to much acclaim a few years ago, and this is a prequel-sequel (both) that can stand alone. I was disappointed that he stayed with those characters, actually, but I had been waiting to see how his writing chops would develop, and I guess this is my (perhaps too soon) chance. The Paragon Hotel by Lyndsay Faye is a historical thriller that covers racial issues in the 1920s mixed up with crime and a mystery. A Million to One by Adiba Jaigirdar is going to take me from historical thriller to historical heist with YA and maybe a little romance. It’s also BIPOC and sapphic. And takes place aboard the Titanic. I don’t have as much hope for this one based on reviews, and yet it just looks like fun. A Good Man Is Hard to Find by Flannery O’Connor, a classic collection of short stories I have been meaning to read for forever from an author I need to read more of. Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult. More race issues tackled by a prolific, popular author who I have read absolutely nothing by. This more recent title is supposed to be one of her best. Hell, I Love Everybody: The Essential James Tate , a poetry collection by James Tate, is a new book of poems which we are reading in honor of poetry month.The Cabinet by Un-Su Kim is South Korean sci-fi and essentially a short story novel. This one promises to be “strange,” but I love the premise: case files on people with mysterious symptoms that might mean a new species. It won the top literary prize in South Korea.Mary Jane by Jessica Anya Blau is the only book I’m slated to read this month that I would not pick up and read myself. I’m not quite sure why, maybe because it feels been-done. But I like Almost Famous and it gets great reviews, so who knows? Maybe I’ll love this rebellious, musical, 70s novel with an unveiled reference to marijuana in its title.

I have technically read less than usual in the past month, but I still landed on three books that I thought rose about the others. (The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep almost tipped it to four, but it’s too far under these three titles for me to put it here. You’ll get the review sometime soon.)

I guess I have some mixed feelings about White Noise by Don DeLillo, but not more than my book club. You don’t want to grab it if you aren’t going to enjoy satire and absurdism set in the 80s (and written in the 80s), but if you do enjoy reading that, then this is top-notch. It received the National Book Award and DeLillo has been honored for his life in letters, this being probably his most famous and lauded book. Also, there is a new movie starring Greta Gerwig, Don Cheadle, and Adam Driver. Don’t expect much of a plot or to like many of the characters; do expect to think about consumerism and death. I loved a few of supporting characters and the crazy, witty dialogue. I also LOLed. Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley was a win-win-win for me. A YA thriller of sorts, it takes place in the upper peninsula of Michigan (partly) on tribal land among the inhabitants of a town that is half-Ojibwe. I mean, there is nothing I don’t get excited about, here. (I’m from Michigan and have some Native heritage and even more interest in Native American culture than actual heritage.) And in the end, it was well-written, engaging. Not perfect, but entertaining and interesting and I got lost in the setting and in the characters. A highly-recommended YA read which is not at all fantastical, though for some reason the cover gave me those vibes. Stay with Me by Ayobami Adebayo was brutal for me to read. Basically, it consists of several of my worst nightmares and then was written from and for a culture (Nigerian) that I don’t know enough about to read from it easily. However, I can see great literature when it hits me in the nose, and this is it. It is a beautiful book full of mystery and atmosphere and memorable moments. And great writing. It does involve polygamy and the loss of a child, just FYI. This slim book was worth any struggle I had with it.