Support independent literary publishers by picking a read from the list below, which features new books forthcoming in April 2026 from CLMP members.
I Used to Be a Pisces by Camilla Gibb
Book*hug Press | April 1, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-77166-968-9
In this poetry collection, Gibb “generously invites us to engage with our surroundings, recognize the relationships that shape our existence, and examine our longing for restoration and regeneration.”
Girl Gone Wild by Courtney Kocak
Trio House Press | April 1, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-949487-54-1
Kocak’s memoir in essays is a “collection of exploits and delusions about chasing your dreams with reckless abandon and what happens when their pursuit becomes a new kind of trap.”
Sheila-Na-Gig Editions | April 1, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-962405-65-2
These poems take readers “on an eclectic journey through the challenges of motherhood, the playful ironies of pop culture, and the current conditions of our country and planet.”
Everyday Omens by Kris Whorton
Sheila-Na-Gig Editions | April 1, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-962405-67-6
The poems in this collection “move between places—from suburban America to European cities, along Alaskan shores to Southern forests—revealing a speaker navigating complex relationships with parents, brothers, and lovers.”
Children of Obscura: This Mysterious Human by Dane Cervine
Sixteen Rivers Press | April 2, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-939639-43-1
These prose poems “reflect the wonders of both the physical science to which we’re bound and the physio-anthropology of humans on this obscure planet rotating in the vastness of space.”
Red Hen Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-63628-459-0
In this novel-in-verse, Fisk “braids together the ordinary tasks of love and work in 1875, a century we’ve almost forgotten but whose human concerns are universal and timeless.”
Shadow Country by Craig Higginson
Catalyst Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-960803-43-6
This historical novel is “at once a war novel, a murder mystery, a multi-layered love story and a robust reassertion of what it is to remain human during the most challenging times.”
The Light Remains by Samantha Keller
Catalyst Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-960803-47-4
“Against the backdrop of complicated, beautiful South Africa in the 1960s,” this novel is “about the weight of family loyalty, the price of independence, and the choices that define us when duty and desire collide.”
Black Lawrence Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-62557-182-3
“A braided, elegiac journey through death and recovery,” this debut poetry collection “takes on loss, anticipatory grief, and the little deaths experienced in the space between mourning and survival.”
The Ritz of the Bayou by Nancy Lemann
Hub City Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 9798885740708
This nonfiction book originally published in 1987 “gives an atmospheric account of the New Orleans trial of the Governor of Louisiana for racketeering, fraud, and bribery.”
The Tinder Sonnets by Jennifer LoveGrove
Book*hug Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-77166-966-5
“Juxtaposing folklore and the natural world against the digital sphere of texting and dating apps,” this poetry collection “defies invisibility and instead confronts and subverts it through a discerning feminist lens.”
26 Weekends in County Jail: A Quaker Journal of Resilience by Joseph Olejak
Flare Books | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-963511-45-1
This memoir documents Olejak’s time being incarcerated as well as his “twenty-year journey towards peace—initially by non-compliance with the military industrial complex.”
Home Is a Door We Carry by Constantin Satüpo
Yonder | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-63206-421-9
According to Kirkus Reviews, this debut picture book “deftly captures the challenging uncertainty of leaving home and the eventual hope of belonging.”
Swimming With Cobras by Rosemary Smith
Catalyst Collective | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-967673-50-6
This memoir offers “rare insight into South Africa’s democratic transition, and the inspiring true story of a community of women who set a new standard for civic responsibility and quietly changed the landscape of an entire nation.”
CavanKerry Press | April 7, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-960327-19-2
“Deeply rooted in the natural world,” the poems in this collection “spill secrets, make trouble, reckon with stories of desire and harm, and explore the agency and oppression of women and girls.”
Daylight / Savings by Lucy Alford
Black Square Editions | April 10, 2026
ISBN: 9798986037080
According to Juliana Spahr, this poetry collection illustrates “the sorts of noticing that are temporal and seasonal, the sorts that cannot be parsed or commodified by this algorithmic era.”
A Splintering by Dur e Aziz Amna
Dzanc Books | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-938603-77-8
“Set against a hypnotic, oppressive backdrop of political violence and natural disaster,” this novel “traces the class struggle of a woman stuck between province and metropolis, between motherhood and ambition.”
These Spaceships Weren’t Built For Us by Alan Chazaro
Tia Chucha Press | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-882688-65-4
In this poetry collection, Chazaro “reconsiders the possibilities of space travel as the son of Mexican immigrants while navigating daily life across rapidly shifting social spaces.”
At the Gate: Uncollected Poems 1987-2010 by Lucille Clifton
Boa Editions | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-960145-98-7
“Discovered in digital archives by poet and scholar Kazim Ali,” this collection “gathers more than seventy previously unpublished poems by the iconic American poet Lucille Clifton written over the last two decades of her life.”
Someone Should Know This Story by Merrill Joan Gerber
Sagging Meniscus | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-963846-53-9
This collection of short fiction written over the course of four decades finds its “starting place with the crises of everyday family life—its conflicts, betrayals, confinements, and its devastating losses.”
Red Hen Press | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-63628-465-1
“Dark, satirical, and razor-sharp,” this novel is a “modern literary thriller that unflinchingly dissects wealth, exploitation, and the perilous line between survival and self-destruction.”
Creekwater Mansions by Ian Hall
EastOver Press | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-958094-66-2
According to James Kimbrell, this debut poetry collection is a “transporting journey into the Appalachian South with all its beauty and decay, its radiance and self-destructive tendencies.”
Slant Books | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-63982-220-1
In this short fiction collection, Howard “takes the reader on a mesmerizing ride through a haunting, haunted landscape of children, drifters, soldiers, lovers, and ghosts, and the unseen forces that shape their lives.”
local remedies by Chiagoziem Jideofor
Host Publications | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 979-8-9905483-6-7
“Exploring Igbo stories through memory, myth, and strangeness,” Jideofor’s poems “scatter a different light—one which illuminates our shared need for remedies, both old and new.”
Book*hug Press | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-77166-974-0
The poems in this collection “look at the physical and emotional implications of trauma but also reveal how being bisexual and disabled can be sources of resilience, joy, and creativity.”
A Thread of Silent Echoes by Patrick Nzabonimpa
Vine Leaves Press | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-3-98832-216-6
This collection of short stories set in Rwanda “captures the emotional crossroads of fourteen unforgettable lives, revealing the quiet tensions, hidden struggles, and fierce hopes that define them.”
The Divining Season by Gwendolyn Paradice
Aunt Lute Books | April 14, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-951874-12-4
“A story wrought with the griefs of womanhood, the burdens of ancestral trauma, and the realities of indigeneity in the United States,” this novel “follows as the community of Larissa reels with its profound losses.”
Telling the Bees by Cathryn Essinger
Sheila-Na-Gig Editions | April 15, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-962405-71-3
In this poetry collection referencing bee folklore, “bees serve as a conduit between the present and the past, between generations, and between species as well.”
The Migraine Diaries by Zach Powers
JackLeg Press | April 15, 2026
ISBN: 978-1956907254
This novel about chronic illness, “told in the unique format of a diagnostic headache journal, is a visionary look at human endurance, as well as a poignant exploration of pain.”
I am Twig, Bone, Feather by Angie Athanassiades
Vine Leaves Press | April 21, 2026
ISBN: 978-3-98832-214-2
According to Samantha Clark, this “fiercely beautiful” memoir of prose poetry “cracks open the darkness and pain of sexual assault to reveal light, hope and a sense of freedom.”
The Soldier’s House by Helen Benedict
Red Hen Press | April 21, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-63628-278-7
In this novel, Benedict “tells the story of an Iraq War veteran who saves the lives of his assassinated Iraqi interpreter’s widow, child, and mother by bringing them to his upstate New York home.”
Get Funky, Get Swoll by Akhim Yuseff Cabéy
Black Lawrence Press | April 21, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-62557-183-0
According to Marcus Jackson, Cabéy’s voice “exquisitely portrays the ways in which the soul survives and flourishes despite America’s multi-century addictions to racism, violence, and coerced performance.”
Growth Growth Growth by Julian Cobbing
Catalyst Collective | April 21, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-967673-00-1
This history book “exposes the historical roots of our converging problems—destruction of the environment, the massacre of other species, running down of oil reserves, global heating, and the nuclear threat to all of us.”
The Fall-Down Effect by Liz Johnston
Book*hug Press | April 21, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-77166-962-7
“Exploring protest, climate change, and fractured family relationships,” this debut novel “asks what we really owe people in our lives when we are fighting for a greater cause.”
Sixteen Rivers Press | April 21, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-939639-45-5
In this collection of poems, “artworks are deconstructed and reconstructed with sharp-eyed linguistic grace and originality.”
Walk the Night by David Armand
TRP: The University Press of SHSU | April 27, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-68003-448-6
According to Kent Wascom, this novel is a “stone-cold classic of Southern Horror: the horror of lost childhood, the horror of parents’ voices raised and desperate in the next room, the horror of the past that lives within us all.”
Canicula/Dog Days by William Archila
Translated from the Spanish by Mario Zetino
Red Hen Press | April 28, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-63628-453-8
This bilingual poetry collection “takes the reader on a poignant journey from the unrest in El Salvador in the 1980s to the urban landscape of the US immigrant, revealing the turmoil and memory of the disempowered, the impoverished, and the displaced.”
Jelly, Baby: Essays on Disability and Vulnerability by Therese Estacion
Book*hug Press | April 28, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-77166-964-1
In this collection of lyric and poetic essays, Estacion “confronts her own internalized ableism and unpacks how she has come to terms with disability in all its complexity.”
Dickens in Brooklyn: Essays on Family, Writing, & Madness by Jay Neugeboren
EastOver Press | April 28, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-958094-64-8
This book is a “virtuoso collection of unusual, compelling essays” in which Neugeboren “explores experiences that have been central to his life.”
The Blood Year Daughter by G. G. Silverman
Creature Publishing | April 28, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-951971-41-0
According to Publishers Weekly, Silverman’s debut collection features twelve “fairy tale–inflected horror stories that center women and girls who survive, transform, and protect themselves in worlds shaped by violence and desire.”
Fugitive but Gorgeous by Elinor Ann Walker
Sheila-Na-Gig Editions | April 30, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-962405-62-1
In this collection of poetry and short prose, “female personae are often themselves fugitive, seeking outlets from confining relationships, prescribed roles, and gendered legacies as they redefine their desires.”
Every Single Beast of My Heart by Pamela Wax
Sheila-Na-Gig Editions | April 30, 2026
ISBN: 978-1-962405-63-8
“Framed through the lens of the five Zen remembrances,” Wax’s debut chapbook “weaves poems on aging, mortality, myth, and folklore into a meditation on impermanence.”
