Compulsive Reader

Compulsive Reader News
maggieball@compulsivereader.com
http://www.compulsivereader.com
Volume 29, Issue 4, 1 April 2026

==============================================

IN THIS ISSUE

New Reviews at Compulsive Reader
Literary News
Competition News
Sponsored By
Coming soon

==============================================

Hello readers. Here is the latest batch of reviews and interviews:

A review of Goddess of Swizzle by Shirley Brewer

Beauty, love, and humor are all on display in Shirley Brewer’s charming new collection, Goddess of Swizzle. The collection, a banquet for all the senses, is divided into five sections whose titles metaphorically appeal to the tongue and nose – A feast for here and now, Thick brushstrokes garnish the menu, The moon could use a little more sugar, Limburger – a fragrance fierce as love, and Even the green Spanish olives lighten up, all lines taken from one of the poems in each section. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/28/a-review-of-goddess-of-swizzle-by-shirley-brewer/

A review of Bring Us Home From Sorrow by Joanne Fedler

Though Bring Us Home From Sorrow is a book that moves through death and deep grief, it is expansive and even in its darkest moments, uplifting. It reminds us that none of us are alone – that we are all held in our grief by the communities we belong to and the unique forms of grief and love that everyone experiences. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/26/a-review-of-bring-us-home-from-sorrow-by-joanne-fedler/

A review of Madelaine Before the Dawn by Sandrine Collette

The plot is simple, but in Collette’s hands, and Anderson’s translation, the prose soars, delivering shimmering men, women and children caught in a never-ending cycle of labor in fields. Hope rises and falls. And while love is a luxury, it’s as seeded in the novel as the seeds the farmers plant in their fields. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/23/a-review-of-madelaine-before-the-dawn-by-sandrine-collette/

A review of Golden Armor by Armenida Qyqja

Golden Armor by Armenia Qyqja, a full-length poetry collection of a 111 pages, is an empathetic, ingenious, heartfelt, and passionate manuscript full of feministic candor, by an Albanian poet, showing readers how and what it means to stay alive mentally, physically, and emotionally during and after war. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/22/a-review-of-golden-armor-by-armenida-qyqja/

A review of The Grief Shop and Other Stories from a Broken World by Alex DiFrancesco

The book focuses on what could be considered the walking wounded, if it weren’t for their respective nuances and depth, along with surprising turns of humor. The stories are marked by the shadow of a singular, mostly unspoken, ‘tragedy’; however, the collection notably avoids the trap of victimization despite the cataclysmic proportions of its world. Read more:

A review of Tangerinn by Emanuela Anechoum

It may take readers a moment to adjust to that narrative form, but the immediacy it provides is worth it. It’s a history and a conversation, the kind where you leave what was behind and move into the present state of what is. Interior reckoning goes a long way and is itself a form of migration, maybe even another form of death in the father’s and daughter’s struggle to align identity with a self in a foreign land. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/14/a-review-of-tangerinn-by-emanuela-anechoum/

A review of The Millionaire Mop: Your Path to Cleaning Business Wealth by Nats Cleaning

One of the book’s strongest features is its straightforward structure. It doesn’t assume readers have business experience or a large budget. Instead, it walks through how to launch with minimal investment and begin earning quickly—framing early traction as a confidence-builder and a way to reinvest into the business. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/12/a-review-of-the-millionaire-mop-your-path-to-cleaning-business-wealth-by-nats-cleaning/

A review of The Meaning of Fear by Laura Hulthen Thomas

The Meaning of Fear is not an easy novel, but it is a necessary one, particularly in today’s world. Readers will find a lot to unpack here and, without a doubt, gain insight into the ramifications of abuse. At the same time, fans of suspense are in for an adrenaline-charged ride, penned by a top-notch storyteller. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/11/a-review-of-the-meaning-of-fear-by-laura-hulthen-thomas/

A review of Dear Letters in the Red Box by Sarah Stern

Sarah Stern’s book Dear Letters in the Red Box is an invitation into her family. We grieve with her over the loss of her elderly and ponder the insights she gleans from the past. This is a book of memories. Themes of light, alienation, surrender, knowing and not knowing, are explored in love-filled snapshots of family members, primarily her mother, also a poet. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/09/a-review-of-dear-letters-in-the-red-box-by-sarah-stern/

A review of The Distance of a Shout by Michael Ondaatje

What this collection confirms is that Ondaatje is, beyond all, a master storyteller, largely through his ability to capture character with the same precision he chooses words. Each personality presented here, be it a blurred face in a photo or a close friend or lover, draws us in. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/07/a-review-of-the-distance-of-a-shout-by-michael-ondaatje/

A review of Identifying the Pathogen: An Inquiry by Jennifer Militello

Militello weaves different perspectives into the collection, sometimes stepping away from the point-of-view of the main persona and drawing parallels with her own life and of women today. She looks at the persona from the angle of both subject and object, introducing what it feels like to undergo surgery and calling it an autopsy report. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/05/a-review-of-identifying-the-pathogen-an-inquiry-by-jennifer-militello/

A review of But Where’s Home: A Novella and Stories by Toni Ann Johnson

Johnson’s writing–her vivid detail, sharp dialogue and insightful, deftly witty scenes–reveal a family of distinct, complicated individuals grappling with the internal and external impact of our society’s stereotypes, but also asks us to look more closely at our own relationships. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/04/a-review-of-but-wheres-home-a-novella-and-stories-by-toni-ann-johnson/

A review of Loving my Enemies and Other Outlandish Pursuits by Angie Wright

Angie Wright’s memoir Loving My Enemies and Other Outlandish Pursuits highlights the cultural and ideological diversity of the American South and illuminates the long history of dedicated and courageous work on many fronts for social justice. Even more so, the book shares how Angie learns through time that becoming more effective in her life’s work is intertwined with and inextricable from her personal growth and healing. Read more: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/03/02/a-review-of-loving-my-enemies-and-other-outlandish-pursuits-by-angie-wright/

All of the reviews and interviews listed above are available at The Compulsive Reader on the front page. Older reviews and interviews are kept indefinitely in our extensive categorised archives (currently at 3,710) which can be browsed or searched from the front page of the site.

==============================================

LITERARY NEWS

In the news this month, a shortlist has been selected for the 2025 Republic of Consciousness Prize, United States and Canada, celebrating “the commitment of small presses to exceptional works of literary merit.” Organisers will distribute a total of $US35,000: each press with a longlisted book receives $US2,000; the five shortlisted books will be rewarded an additional $US3,000 each, split equally between publisher and author, or publisher, author, and translator. The winner will be announced March 10. The shortlist: Dreaming of Dead People by Rosalind Belben (And Other Stories), Little Lazarus by Michael Bible (CLASH Books), The Remembered Soldier by Anjet Daanje, trans. by David McKay (New Vessel Press), The Endless Week by Laura Vazquez, trans. by Alex Niemi (Dorothy, a publishing project), and Hothouse Bloom by Austyn Wohlers (Hub City Press).–

A shortlist has been announced for the European Union Prize for Literature, which recognises “emerging fiction writers from the European Union and beyond.” The Prize honours 41 new literary talents over a three-year period. This year there are 14 shortlisted books, nominated by national entities knowledgeable about the literary scene in their countries and used to promoting their own literature abroad. The winner and two special mentions will be announced May 29 in Warsaw. To see the shortlisted titles, click here: https://euprizeliterature.eu/en/

Finalists have been released for the 2026 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. The winner, who will receive $15,000, will be named in early April, with the remaining four finalists each receiving $5,000. All five authors will be honoured on May 6 at the 46th Anniversary PEN/Faulkner Award Celebration in Washington, D.C. This year’s finalists are: Dominion by Addie E. Citchens (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), The White Hot by Quiara Alegría Hudes (One World), The Sisters by Jonas Hassen Khemiri (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), Heart the Lover by Lily King (Grove Press), Small Scale Sinners by Mahreen Sohail (A Public Space Books).

Winners of the 2026 Audie Awards, sponsored by the Audio Publishers Association, were announced at a gala in New York City. Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins, narrated by Jefferson White (Scholastic Audio) was named Audiobook of the Year. In addition, the inaugural APA Hall of Fame inductees were honoured: narrators George Guidall, Hillary Huber, January LaVoy, Robin Miles, and Simon Vance. To see the Audie winners in the 26 categories, click here: https://www.audiopub.org/2026-audie-winner-press-release

The Association of American Publishers has announced the Excellence winners of its annual PROSE Awards–recognizing “outstanding scholarly publications”–as well as the R.R. Hawkins Award, the overall prize. The winner of the Hawkins Award–and winner of the Excellence in the Humanities Award–is Atlantic Cataclysm: Rethinking the Atlantic Slave Trades by David Eltis (Cambridge University Press). The other three Excellence winners are:
Biological & Life Sciences: Slip: Life in the Middle of Eating Disorder Recovery by Mallary Tenore Tarpley (Simon and Schuster), Social Sciences: The Worst Trickster Story Ever Told: Native America, the Supreme Court, and the U.S. Constitution by Keith Richotte, Jr. (Stanford University Press), and Physical Sciences & Mathematics: Decoherence and Quantum Darwinism: From Quantum Foundations to Classical Reality by Wojciech Hubert Zurek (Cambridge University Press).

A shortlist has been released for the 2026 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. The winners–including the four Mātātuhi Foundation Best First Book Awards recipients and potentially, at the discretion of a specially appointed judge, Te Mūrau o te Tuhi Māori Language Award–will be named at a ceremony on May 13 during the Auckland Writers Festival. Check out the complete NZ Book Awards shortlist here: The winner of the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction receives NZ$65,000, with each of the other main category winners getting NZ$12,000. The Best First Book winners for fiction, poetry, general nonfiction and illustrated nonfiction, are awarded NZ$3,000 each. Check out the full list here: https://www.nzbookawards.nz/new-zealand-book-awards/2026-awards/shortlist

The shortlist has been released for the NZ Booklovers Awards, recognising works in the best adult fiction, children’s picture book, lifestyle, junior fiction, and YA categories. The winner in each category will be named March 19 and each winner will receive NZ$500. Check out the shortlisted titles here: https://www.nzbooklovers.co.nz/2026-awards

A 16-book longlist has been released for the 2026 Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist. The shortlist will be unveiled April 22, and the winner named June 11 at the Women’s Prize Trust’s summer party in London (along with the winner of its sister prize, the 2026 Women’s Prize for Nonfiction). The winner receives £30,000, along with a statuette known as the Bessie, created and donated by the late artist Grizel Niven. This year’s longlisted titles can be found here: https://womensprize.com/revealing-the-2026-womens-prize-for-fiction-longlist/

The finalists have been selected for the 2026 Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards, dedicated to “literature that contributes to our understanding of race and our appreciation of the rich diversity of human cultures” and sponsored by the Cleveland Foundation. Winners in the four categories–fiction, nonfiction, memoir, and poetry–each will receive $30,000. The winners will be announced April 15. See the 11 finalists here: https://www.anisfield-wolf.org/2026/03/anisfield-wolf-book-awards-announces-2026-finalists/

Endling by Maria Reva won the £10,000 Gordon Burn Prize, which honours “exceptional writing which has an unconventional perspective, style or subject matter and often defies easy categorization.”

The longlist has been selected for the 2026 Carol Shields Prize for Fiction, “the largest English-language literary prize for women and non-binary writers in the world.” The winner receives $US150,000 and the four finalists receive $US12,500 each. The shortlist will be announced April 21 and the winner June 2. For the full list visit: https://carolshieldsprizeforfiction.com/

The Remembered Soldier by Anjet Daanje, translated from the Dutch by David McKay (New Vessel Press) has won the 2025 Republic of Consciousness Prize, United States and Canada.

Finalists have been selected for the 2026 Aspen Words Literary Prize, sponsored by Aspen Words, a program of the Aspen Institute, and honouring “a work of fiction that illuminates a vital contemporary issue and demonstrates the transformative power of literature on thought and culture.”

The winner, who receives $US35,000, will be announced April 23 at an awards dinner in New York City that will feature a conversation with finalist authors moderated by Elisabeth Egan, writer and editor at the New York Times Book Review. The winning book will be featured in the annual Community Read sponsored by Aspen Words and Pitkin County Library in Aspen, Colo. As part of the program, free copies of the novel will be distributed throughout Roaring Fork Valley. The finalists: The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) by Rabih Alameddine (Grove Press), Intemperance by Sonora Jha (HarperVia), Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy (Flatiron Books), Endling by Maria Reva (Doubleday), and So Far Gone by Jess Walter (Harper).

A Family Matter by Claire Lynch won the £30,000 Nero Gold Prize, given to a book by an author living in the U.K. or Ireland and sponsored by Caffè Nero, in partnership with the Booksellers Association, Brunel University of London, and Right to Dream.

The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) has released shortlists for the 2026 Carnegie Medal for Writing and Carnegie Medal for Illustrating. The winners, who each receive a gold medal and a £5,000 Colin Mears Award cash prize, will be named June 23 at a live and streamed ceremony in London. Winners of the Shadowers’ Choice Medals–voted for and awarded by the children and young people who shadow the medals–will also be presented at the ceremony. They will receive a medal and £500 worth of books to donate to a library of their choice. For the full shortlists visit: https://carnegies.co.uk/2026-shortlists-announced/

The longlist has been selected for the 2026 Stella Prize, which celebrates “exceptional works by Australian women and non-binary writers.” The shortlist will be announced April 8 and the winner May 13. The winner will receive A$60,000.The longlist: KONTRA by Eunice Andrada (poetry), The Rot by Evelyn Araluen (poetry), Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks (nonfiction/memoir), Ankami by Debra Dank (nonfiction/memoir/social commentary), Fireweather by Miranda Darling (fiction), Apron-Sorrow/Sovereign-Tea by Natalie Harkin (nonfiction), Cannon by Lee Lai (graphic novel), Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy (fiction), Wait Here by Lucy Nelson (fiction), Find Me at the Jaffa Gate: An Encyclopaedia of a Palestinian Family by Micaela Sahhar (nonfiction/memoir), 58 Facets: On Violence and the Law by Marika Sosnowski (nonfiction), and I Am Nannertgarrook by Tasma Walton (fiction).

A shortlist has been selected for the first James Patterson and Bookshop.org Prize. Launched last November, the prize celebrates debut authors, who are nominated and chosen by independent booksellers. The grand prize winner receives $US15,000, the runner-up receives $US10,000. The winner will be announced April 6. The shortlist: The Hollow Half by Sarah Aziza, The Correspondent by Virginia Evans, When the Tides Held the Moon by Venessa Vida Kelley, It’s Different This Time by Joss Richard, and The Lilac People by Milo Todd.

Finalists have been chosen for the 38th annual Publishing Triangle Awards, honouring the best LGBTQ+ books published in 2025. See the 50 finalists here: https://publishingtriangle.org/2026/03/finalists-announced-for-the-38th-annual-publishing-triangle-awards Winners in the 10 categories will be announced on Thursday, April 16, at a ceremony at the New School in New York City. This year’s event, which will be livestreamed, is hosted by poet and activist Emanuel Xavier.

Virginia Evans won the 2026 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel for The Correspondent (Crown). Evans will receive $US10,000. Both Evans and the authors of the other finalists–Susanna Kwan for Awake in the Floating City (Pantheon) and Maggie Su for Blob (Harper Perennial)–will be honoured on April 26 at the 50th Anniversary PEN/Hemingway Award Ceremony, to be held at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston, Mass. They will also be given a two-week residency at Ucross Foundation, which includes a private studio space, living accommodations, meals prepared by a professional chef, and staff support on Ucross’s 20,000-acre ranch in northern Wyoming.

A shortlist has been selected for the £20,000 Swansea University Dylan Thomas Prize. The British Library will host a shortlist celebratory event on May 13, with the winner named during a ceremony in Swansea on May 14 (International Dylan Thomas Day). This year’s shortlisted titles are: To Rest Our Minds and Bodies by Harriet Armstrong (novel, U.K), We Pretty Pieces of Flesh by Colwill Brown (novel, U.K.), Joy Is My Middle Name by Sasha Debevec-McKenney (poetry, U.S.), Under the Blue by Suzannah V. Evans (poetry, U.K.), Open, Heaven by Seán Hewitt (novel, U.K.), and Borderline Fiction by Derek Owusu (novel, U.K.).

The Shortlists have been selected for the James Tait Black Prizes, honouring “the best work of fiction and biography” and judged by University of Edinburgh scholars and literature students. Each winner receives £10,000. Winners will be announced in May. The shortlist for the fiction prize: Big Kiss, Bye Bye by Claire-Louise Bennett, Darryl by Jackie Ess. On the Greenwich Line by Shady Lewis, translated by Katharine Halls, Sakina’s Kiss by Vivek Shanbhag, translated by Srinath Perur, and The Original by Nell Stevens. The shortlist for the biography prize are The First and Last King of Haiti by Marlene Daut, Things that Disappear: Reflections and Memories by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated by Kurt Beals, The Cadence of a Song: The Life of Margaret Fay Shaw by Fiona Mackenzie, Oliver Twist & Me: The True Story of My Family and Charles Dickens’s Best-Loved Novel by Nicholas Blincoe, and Horace: Poet on a Volcano by Peter Stothard.

Shortlists have been selected for the 2026 Lambda Literary Awards. Finalists will be celebrated and winners announced on June 12 at Sony Hall in New York City. To see the shortlisted titles in 26 categories, click here: https://lambdaliterary.org/2026/03/announcing-the-finalists-for-the-38th-lambda-literary-awards/

Australian independent booksellers have announced Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy (Penguin Australia) as the best book from the last year, and the winner of the Indie Book Awards 2026 Book of the Year (and of course the Fiction book of the year). Other winners include, nonfiction, Always Home, Always Homesick by Hannah Kent (Picador Australia), Debut fiction: When Sleeping Women Wake by Emma Pei Yin (Hachette Australia), Illustrated non-fiction: Wild by Design by Tim Pilgrim (Murdoch Books), Children’s: Silverborn: The Mystery of Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend (Lothian Children’s Books), and Young Adult: Eleanor Jones is Playing with Fire by Amy Doak (Penguin Australia). The Awards recognise and celebrate indie booksellers as the number one supporters of Australian authors. The Book of the Year is voted by independent booksellers across the country from the six category winners.

The longlist has been selected for the 14th annual Plutarch Award, “the only international literary award for biography judged exclusively by biographers,” and sponsored by the Biographers International Organization (BIO). Five finalists will be named soon, and the winner will be announcing during the annual BIO Conference May 28-29 in New York City. The longlist: Baldwin: A Love Story by Nicholas Boggs (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
The Einstein of Sex: Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, Visionary of Weimar Berlin by Daniel Brook (W. W. Norton), Emerson’s Daughters: Ellen Tucker Emerson, Edith Emerson Forbes, and Their Family Legacy by Kate Culkin (University of Massachusetts Press), The Many Lives of Anne Frank by Ruth Franklin (Yale University Press), The Second Emancipation: Nkrumah, Pan-Africanism, and Global Blackness at High Tide by Howard W. French (Liveright), Wakara’s America: The Life and Legacy of a Native Founder of the American West by Max Perry Mueller (Basic Books), Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin by Sue Prideaux (W. W. Norton), Pride and Pleasure: The Schuyler Sisters in an Age of Revolution by Amanda Vaill (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife by Francesca Wade (Scribner), and The Invention of Charlotte Brontë: A New Life by Graham Watson (Pegasus Books).

ArtsNL revealed three finalists for the C$12,500 BMO Winterset Award, which celebrates excellence in Newfoundland and Labrador writing across all genres. The winner will be named April 9. This year’s finalists are: The Saltbox Olive by Angela Antle, Cautiously Pessimistic by Debbie McGee, and Veal by Mackenzie Nolan.

This Is About an Alligator and Nothing Else by Anna Dempsey won the inaugural £7,500 Hilary Mantel Prize for Fiction, which was launched last September by AM Heath, the late Booker Prize-winning author’s literary agency, along with publisher John Murray, the Bookseller reported. Uduak-Abasi Ekong was named runner-up for A Kind of Resurrection and will receive £2,500. Dempsey also has been given a place on an Arvon residential writing course and Ekong a place on an Arvon masterclass.

The shortlist has been released for the 2026 Women’s Prize for Nonfiction, a sister prize to the Women’s Prize for Fiction. The award is sponsored by Findmypast. The winner, who will be named on June 11 at the Women’s Prize Trust’s summer party in London (along with the Women’s Prize for Fiction), receives £30,000 and a limited-edition artwork known as the “Charlotte,” both given by the Charlotte Aitken Trust. This year’s shortlisted titles are: The Finest Hotel in Kabul: A People’s History of Afghanistan by Lyse Doucet, Art Cure: The Science of How the Arts Transform Our Health by Daisy Fancourt, Artists, Siblings, Visionaries: The Lives and Loves of Gwen and Augustus John by Judith Mackrell, Hotel Exile: Paris in the Shadow of War by Jane Rogoyska, Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy, and Nation of Strangers: Rebuilding Home in the 21st Century by Ece Temelkuran.

A longlist has been released for the 2026 Griffin Poetry Prize. Judges Andrea Cote, Luke Hathaway, and Major Jackson each read 461 books of poetry, including 34 translations from 19 languages, submitted by 219 publishers from 42 different countries. The shortlist will be revealed April 22 and a winner named June 3 at the Griffin Poetry Prize Readings in Toronto. The winner receives C$130,000, while the other shortlisted authors each get C$10,000. Check out this year’s longlisted titles here: https://griffinpoetryprize.com/press/2026-longlist-announcement/

Longlists have been revealed for the 2026 Jhalak Prose Prize, the Jhalak Children’s & YA Prize, and the Jhalak Poetry Prize. The awards “seek to celebrate books by writers of colour in the U.K. and Ireland.” Shortlists will be released April 14 and the winners named June 10. Each winner receives £1,000. Find the lists here: https://www.jhalakprize.com/the-prize

Finally, the 2026 Newcastle Poetry Prize has been announced. First Prize went to “Late sonnets” by Greg McLaren. Second Prize to “Growing Vegetables” by Luoyang Chen, Third Prize to “my mother walks every day up a hill” by Emilie Collyer. The Harri Jones Memorial Prize went to “Against the shore and ascending” by Mitch Cave. The Jan Dean Member Award went to “Broken Vietnamese: Sonnet Sequence” by Duc Dau, and the Kade Fenwick Prize went to “Harrowing Climates” by Peter Mitchell.

Have a great month.

==============================================

COMPETITION NEWS

Congratulations to Jean Feingold who won a copy of Apple & Palm by Patricia Henley.

Congratulations also to Debra Guyette who won a copy of Last Night at the Disco by Lisa Borders.

Our new giveaway is for a copy of Range of Motion by Brian Trapp. To win, send me an email at maggieball@compulsivereader.com with the subject line “Range of Motion” and your postal address in the body of the mail.

We also have a copy of Seang (Hungering) by Anne Casey. Read our review here: https://compulsivereader.com/2026/02/17/a-review-of-seang-hungering-by-anne-casey/ and check out the interview with Anne below). To win, send me an email at maggieball@compulsivereader.com with the subject line “Seang” and your postal address in the body of the mail.

Good luck!

==================================================