Aardvark Book Club is a monthly book subscription box in which members choose up to 3 hardcover books each month from a selection of new releases or previous selections. Aardvark Book Club ships to both the U.S. and Canada and provides a platform to discuss books. To get your first book for $4, use the promo code READBETWEENTHESPINES.
Hints
Book #1
Hint 1.1: TRUTH: What’s the biggest secret you’ve kept from your parents?
DARE: Let the person next to you give you a haircut.
Hint 2 Quiz: 2. Tartan; 6. True; 10. Mary; 22. Presbyterian; 28. Sheep
Hint 3.5: Brokeback Mountain, Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart, The Policeman by Bethan Roberts, God’s Own Country, Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin, The Ballad of Wallace Island, Banshees, Rams, & The New Life by Tom Crewe
John of John
Douglas Stuart
From the Booker Prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author of Shuggie Bainand Young Mungo comes a vivid, moving novel following a young man returning to his Hebridean island home, a portrait of a father’s expectations and a son’s desires.
Out of money and with little to show for his art school education, John-Calum Macleod takes the ferry back home to the Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides to find that little has changed except for him. He returns to the windswept croft and the two pillars of his childhood: his father John, a sheep farmer, tweed weaver, and lay preacher in the local Presbyterian church, and his maternal grandmother Ella, a profanity-loving Glaswegian whose steady warmth helped Cal weather the sudden departure of his mother.
Cal privately wonders if any lonely men might be found on the barren hillsides of home, while John is dismayed by his son’s long hair, strange clothes, and seeming unwillingness to be Saved. But Cal isn’t the only one in the croft house who is keeping secrets. As lambing season turns to shearing season, the threads holding together the community together become increasingly frayed, and nothing will remain as it was before.
John of John is a singular novel about duty, passion, and the transformative power of the truth. It is a magnificent literary work that cements Douglas Stuart’s reputation as one of our greatest novelists working today.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Date: May 5, 2026
Publisher: Grove Press
Book #2
Hint 1.2: TRUTH: What’s something you’ve never told your therapist?
DARE: Accept a job you find on craigslist, the sketchier the better.
Hint 2 Quiz: 3. Craigslist; 14. Quartz; 15. Rotary phone; 21. Oregon; 27. 3 days
Hint 3.3: Barbarian, It Ends, From, Knock at the Cabin, We Used to Live Here by Marcus Kliewer, Creep, The Cabin in the Woods, The Place Where They Buried Your Heart by Christina Henry, & Oculus
The Caretaker
Marcus Kliewer
From Marcus Kliewer, a new titan of the macabre and unsettling, comes a supernatural horror about a young woman who accepts a caretaking job from Craigslist, only to discover the position has consequences far greater—and more dangerous—than she ever could have imagined.
EXCITING OPPORTUNITY:
Caretaker urgently needed. Three days of work. Competitive pay. Serious applicants ONLY.
Macy Mullins can’t say why the job posting grabbed her attention—it had the pull of a fisherman’s lure, barbed hook and all—vaguely ominous. But after an endless string of failed job interviews, she’s not exactly in the position to be picky. She has rent to pay, groceries to buy, and a younger sister to provide for.
Besides, it’s only three days’ work…
Three days, cooped up in a stranger’s house, surrounded by Oregon Coast wilderness.
What starts as a peculiar side gig soon becomes a waking nightmare. An incomprehensible evil may dwell on this property—and Macy Mullins might just be the only thing standing between it, and the rest of humanity.
Follow the Rites…
Follow the Rites…
Follow the Rites…
..— / ….. / —..
Genre: Gothic Fiction, Horror
Publication Date: April 21, 2026
Publisher: Emily Bestler Books
Book #3
Hint 1.3: TRUTH: What was the biggest argument you’ve had in your marriage?
DARE: Confess your feelings to your best friend’s ex.
Hint 2 Quiz: 9. Omaha; 16. Thursday; 23. White Rabbit; 29. Stevie Nicks; 30. Cubism
Hint 3.6: Big Summer by Jennifer Weiner, The Last Five Years, Blue Sisters by Coco Mellos, Last Couple Standing by Matthew Norman, Slow Dance by Rainbow Rowell, Sunny Side Up by Katie Sturino, Heartburn by Nora Ephron, Fun for the Whole Family by Jennifer E. Smith, & Modern Love
Cherry Baby
Rainbow Rowell
#1 New York Times bestselling author Rainbow Rowell returns with a breathtakingly honest novel about a woman who lost everything — and isn’t sure she wants it back.
Everybody knows that Cherry’s husband, Tom, is in Hollywood making a movie . . .
Almost nobody knows that he isn’t coming home.
Tom is the creator of Thursday—a semi-autobiographical webcomic that’s become an international phenomenon.
Semi-autobiographical. That means there’s a character in this movie based on Cherry . . . “Baby.”
Wide-hipped, heavy-chested, double-chinned Baby.
Cherry never wanted this. No fat girl wants to see herself caricatured on the page—let alone on the big screen. But there’s no getting away from it. Baby looks so much like Cherry that strangers recognize her at the grocery store.
While her soon-to-be ex-husband is in Los Angeles getting rich and famous and being the internet’s latest boyfriend, Cherry is stuck in Omaha taking care of the dog he always wanted and the house they were going to raise a family in . . . and wondering who she’s supposed to be without him.
Cherry had promised to love Tom through thick and thin.
She’d meant it.
One night, Cherry decides to leave all her problems, including Tom’s overgrown puppy, at home. She ventures out to see her favorite band play her favorite album . . . and someone recognizes her from across the room.
Russ Sutton knew Cherry when she was a young art student with a fondness for pin-up dresses and patent leather heels. Before Tom.
Russ knows Cherry. He likes Cherry.
And best of all . . . he’s never heard of Thursday.
Tender, funny, and utterly human, Cherry Baby is Rainbow Rowell’s richest, most surprising—sexiest—novel yet.
Genre: Romance
Publication Date: April 14, 2026
Publisher: William Morrow
Book #4
Hint 1.4: TRUTH: If you could have one “do-over” in your life, what would it be?
DARE: Attempt to navigate the London tube without a map.
Hint 2 Quiz: 4. Psychopath; 12. London; 13. Gideon; 18. Sonny; 25. True
Hint 3.1: The Push by , Locke, Tilt by Emma Pattee, Circle, Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty, 12 Angry Men, The Measure by Nikki Erlick, Sliding Doors, & Solar Bones by Mike McCormack
Five
Ilona Bannister
Five lives. Five stories. Four will live—one will die. Who it will be? In this slow-burn masterpiece of psychological fiction, the choice is all yours.
Have you ever tried to pass the time by imagining the lives of the strangers standing next to you? Ilona Bannister’s Five introduces readers to five seemingly random people waiting for a train. But these are not just any five people. From the beginning we know that one of them is going to die soon. Very soon. In five minutes the next train to London will arrive, killing one of them. But before this happens you will learn their stories.
None of these people are saints. Readers might fall in love with the beautiful young man who is on the verge of gambling his life away. They may pity the cantankerous old woman who has fallen to the ground yet is refusing help. Perhaps readers will look away from the child throwing a tantrum. Or judge his mother, who must surely be to blame. And some will be curiously compelled by the successful and damaged businessman orbiting them all.
These are the candidates for this morning’s misfortune. But they don’t know it. Only you know. And you, our complicit reader, will not be able to resist deciding who deserves to walk away, and who deserves only five more minutes to live.
An incredibly original novel that breaks the fourth wall and asks the reader to be judge, jury, and executioner, Five looks at some of the most complicated issues of contemporary life: motherhood, disability, addiction. Every stranger has a story. And in Ilona Bannister’s skillful hands, five people’s stories come together to create an unforgettable novel.
Genre: Psychological Fiction
Publication Date: May 5, 2026
Publisher: Crown
Book #5
Hint 1.5: TRUTH: When was the last time you lied?
DARE: Attempt to sell a forged painting to a dangerous gang.
Hint 2 Quiz: 7. Marie Antoinette; 19. Forgery; 20. Arsenic; 24. Pilcrow; 31. Escort
Hint 3.2: The Duke and I by Julie Quinn, The Gentle Art of Fortune Hunting by K.J. Charles, The Secret Lives of Color by Kasia St. Clair, All of Us Murderers by K.J. Charles, The Reluctant Widow by Georgette Heyer, The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee, The Affair of the Necklace, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, & The Resurrectionist by A. Rae Dunlap
How to Fake It in Society
K.J. Charles
Bridgerton meets The Goldfinch in How to Fake It in Society, a stunning queer romance by rising genre star KJ Charles.
It is 1821 and Nicolas-Marc, Comte de Valois de La Motte is making a splash in London Society. The son of Jeanne de Valois de La Motte, infamous for stealing a priceless diamond necklace meant for Marie Antoinette, Nico hopes to restore his wronged mother’s reputation, if only he can raise the funds. But he must operate with great secrecy, because the Bourbon dynasty murdered his mother, and he fears for his life.
At least, that’s what he tells Titus Pilcrow. Titus was a simple shopkeeper, making and selling artists’ paints, when he found himself suddenly married to an immensely wealthy woman who wanted to disinherit her nephew on her deathbed. As word spreads of his fortune, Titus finds himself a target of every scammer and beggar in London…including one Nicolas-Marc, Comte de Valois de La Motte.
Nico is on his last legs, out of money, and on the run from some terrifying gangsters. When Titus offers Nico a space in his household, it’s the perfect chance for him to exploit London’s newest golden purse–until he falls in love with the man he needs to cheat. Still, Nico is sure they can have a happy ending together. If he can just find his way out of his own web of lies…
Genre: Romance
Publication Date: April 28, 2026
Publisher: Bramble
Book #6:
Hint 1.6: TRUTH: What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?
DARE: Go on a ghost tour during the witching hour.
Hint 2 Quiz: 5. True; 8. Hungry Ghost Festival; 11. False; 17. Japan; 26. Shenzhen
Hint 3.4: Immortal Longings by Chloe Gong, The Poet Empress by Shen Tao, The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang, Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker, Ghostbusters, Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden, Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker, Vicious by V.E. Schwab, & Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo
The Girl with a Thousand Faces
Sunyi Dean
From the USA Today bestselling author of The Book Eaters comes The Girl with a Thousand Faces, a stunning Gothic tale set in a historical Hong Kong that meshes ancient myths and local legends into a haunting story of ghosts, grief, and women who will not forgive.
When Mercy Chan washes up on the shores of Hong Kong with no family, no money, and no memories, the only refuge she finds is the infamous, ghost-infested slum of Kowloon Walled City. Since then, she has rebuilt her life, working for the local triad as a ghost talker and dealing with the angry and bitter spirits who haunt the district. The filthy gutters and cramped alleyways of Kowloon have become her home.
But the past Mercy can’t remember isn’t done with her. An unusually powerful ghost has infested Kowloon’s waterways, drowning innocents and threatening the district. It claims to know Mercy―and secrets from her past that are best left forgotten.
As Mercy is drawn into a deadly cat-and-mouse game with this malignant spirit, she begins to realize that the monster she fights within these walls may well be one of her own making.
Genre: Fantasy
Publication Date: May 5, 2026
Publisher: Tor Books
