She Contains Multitudes
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Girlhood is not a one-size-fits-all journey—it is a rollercoaster of experiences, identities, and contradictions. It is chaos, it is rage, it is beauty, it is survival. As girls grow into women, they navigate a world that often seeks to define them too narrowly, yet their realities are anything but uniform.
These books explore the vast spectrum of girlhood and womanhood in different bodies, cultures, and circumstances. From innocence and resilience to rebellion and self-discovery, these narratives invite us to rethink what it means to be a girl—and how those meanings evolve, clash, and coexist over time.
A searing new novel by the best-selling and award-winning author of Americanah and We Should All Be Feminists. In Dream Count, Adichie trains her fierce eye on different women in a sparkling, transcendent novel that takes up the very nature of love itself. Is true happiness ever attainable or is it just a fleeting state? And how honest must we be with ourselves in order to love, and to be loved? A trenchant reflection on the choices we make and those made for us, on daughters and mothers, on our interconnected world, Dream Count pulses with emotional urgency and poignant, unflinching observations on the human heart, in language that soars with beauty and power.
2035—In the shadow of a race-course, two sisters grow up, helping their mother at the local cafe that serves renowned ramen. Family life is fractious especially when one of them loses their day-job to an automaton. What makes the sisters' hearts sing is their friendship with Today, a nationally famous racehorse. But after a lifetime of over-racing, Today is being sent to the knackers’ yard. Urgently, the sisters plot to rescue their beloved horse. As their plan unfolds, one of them will commit the bravest act of their life. A Thousand Blues is a healing hymn to the Earth, to animals, to our humanity. Brimming with heart, hope and rage, it is a book to cherish, share and re-read.
An extraordinary, thrilling novel about sex, disability and power. Born with a congenital muscle disorder, Shaka Isawa has severe spine curvature and uses an electric wheelchair and ventilator. Within the limits of her care home, her life is lived online: she studies, she tweets indignantly, she posts outrageous stories on an erotica website. One day, a new male carer reveals he has read it all—the sex, the provocation, the dirt. Her response? An indecent proposal… Acclaimed instantly as one of the most important Japanese novels of the 21st century, Hunchback is an extraordinary, thrilling glimpse into the desire and darkness of a woman placed at humanity’s edge.
Florence knows all about failure. The only things she’s proud of are her increasingly elaborate nail art choices—and her ten-year-old son, Dylan. But when Alfie Risby, Dylan's bitter class rival, mysteriously vanishes on a school trip, Dylan becomes a prime suspect. Florence has to get her act together, find the missing boy and clear her son’s name or risk losing him forever. But she doesn’t have any detective skills and she’s just found Alfie’s backpack hidden under Dylan’s bed… All the Other Mothers Hate Me is an irresistibly witty novel about fitting in, starting over and the lengths we’ll go to for the people we love.
Medea longs for a different life. Since childhood, she has been separated from her sister, shunned by her mother, and persecuted and tormented by her brother and father. All because of a unique and dangerous talent: witchcraft. But when a dashing young hero, Jason, arrives to claim the famed Golden Fleece that her father fiercely protects, Medea sees her opportunity for escape. Her offer to help Jason overcome the trials set by her father sets in motion a journey that will test every ounce of her strength, magic and loyalty; a journey that will see her battle monsters, dethrone kings and fall in love.
Visceral, speculative body horror from the author of Boy Parts and Penance—the first collection from a major voice in British fiction. A teenager longs for perfect skin. A scientist tends to fragile alien flora. A young man takes the night into his own hands. Each of these characters has a desperate desire. Can any of them be sated? Unsettling, revelatory, and laced with her signature dark humour, Eliza Clark's debut short story collection plumbs the depths of that most basic human feeling: hunger.
To the outside world, Clove has it all. Thanks to her lies, she's landed the life of her dreams, complete with a kind, reliable husband, two adorable children, a stable family home. But then a letter arrives from a women's prison—a letter that threatens to expose the secrets of a past she has worked so hard to hide. Soon, Clove will become caught up in a dangerous game of cat and mouse with the very people she thought she had outrun. No amount of shopping, green juice or meditation can help her avoid the defining day of her life forever. Brave, hilarious and full of surprising twists, Madwoman is a story about violence, recovery, and Clove's refusal to be defined by her worst experiences.
A brand-new horror novel from the New York Times bestselling author of How to Sell a Haunted House and The Final Girl Support Group. Set in Florida in the 1970s, Grady Hendrix's newest novel follows five young women in a home for unwed mothers who find a guide to witchcraft.
But if a life looks too good to be true, it probably is. Thirteen days before they are due to be married, Kit reveals an awful truth, cracking the façade Piglet has created. It has the power to strip her of the life she has so carefully built, so smugly shared. To do something about it would be to self-destruct. But what will it cost her to do nothing? As the hours count down to their wedding, Piglet is torn between a growing appetite and the desire to follow the recipe, follow the rules. Surely, with her husband, she could be herself again. Wouldn’t it be a waste for everything to curdle now?
The Blue sisters have always been exceptional—and exceptionally different. Avery, a strait-laced lawyer, is the typical eldest daughter, hiding a secret that could undo her perfect life forever. Bonnie was a boxer—until a reckless act one night threatens to drive her out of the city. Lucky, the rebellious youngest, is a model whose hard-partying ways are finally catching up with her. Then there was Nicky, the fourth sister, whose unexpected death left the sisters reeling. Reuniting to stop the sale of their childhood home, they find that it's only by returning to each other that they can navigate their grief, addiction and heartbreak and learn to fall in love with life again.
Before she thinks of herself as Little Alien, our protagonist is a lonely little girl who doesn’t understand the world the way other children seem to. So, when a late-night TV special introduces her to the mysterious Voynich Manuscript—an ancient tome written in an indecipherable language—Little Alien experiences something she hasn’t before: hope. Could there be others like her, who also feel like they’re from another planet? Convinced the Voynich Manuscript holds the answers she needs, Little Alien and her best (and only) friend Bobby decide they must find this strange book. Where that decision leads them will change everything.
Baby is a dancer at a strip club and at the age of 27, she’s feeling lost. It seems that only Dino, her sweet, cross-dressing, drug-dealing ex-boyfriend can keep her afloat. So, when Dino disappears, she plunges into San Francisco’s shady erotic underground to find him. Baby searches through dive bars and old haunts, encountering clients like Simon, a recluse paying her for increasingly bizarre 'favours', a philosophizing suicide fetishist named ‘Nobody’, and co-workers like Emeline, the new hire who seems to want to steal Baby’s whole identity. It’s not long before she starts to find cryptic notes hidden in her belongings and realises her search is attracting the wrong kind of attention.
Alice and Tom are made for each other. Deeply connected, they even share a toothbrush. It’s all picture perfect. Except they have never met. Alice has been cleaning Tom’s apartment for a year. With every smudge wiped from his coffee cup, Alice spirals deeper into infatuation, imagining a love so powerful it might erase a lifetime of self-hatred and loneliness. But as Alice prepares for the moment when she and Tom will finally meet face-to-face, the line between fantasy and reality becomes ever more blurred, shattering everything Alice thought she knew. Told in Alice’s compelling, deliciously acidic voice, this book is a literary study of unreliability and unlikability.