For a book person, there’s no pleasure like watching a great writer reach an audience. This month, several women at various stages of their careers are poised to break out and find a wide readership.
Susan Choi is the author of four previous novels; she’s gotten excellent reviews but isn’t a household name. Trust Exercise may change that. Our starred review describes it as “the story of obsessive first love between drama students at a competitive performing arts high school in the early 1980s [which] twists into something much darker….Never sentimental; always thrillingly alive.” And this is a busy season for Choi; her first picture book, Camp Tiger, is coming out in May and also earned a starred review.
Canadian novelist Miriam Toews has been flying just below the radar in the U.S. for a while; her last novel, All My Puny Sorrows, was published by McSweeney’s in 
2014 to a chorus of praise, and earlier books were published by HarperCollins, Counterpoint, and Arcade. Perhaps Bloomsbury will be the one to break her out with her new book, Women Talking, which combines her longtime interest in Mennonite communities with a timely story about systemic sexual abuse of women and girls. “Stunningly original and altogether arresting” says our starred review.
Sally Rooney’s first novel, Conversations with Friends, was huge in Britain; it was named book of the year by Waterstones, among other honors. Her second, Normal People, has already won the Costa Book Award, and it’s poised to get just as much attention in the U.S. Our starred review calls it “absolutely enthralling.”
Keep an eye out for this first novel, too. Here’s what our starred review says about Miracle Creek by Angie Kim: “Intricate plotting and courtroom theatrics, combined with moving insight into parenting special needs children and the psychology of immigrants, make this book both a learning experience and a page-turner. Should be huge.”
Laurie Muchnick is the fiction editor.
