Book clubs 2026-03: Options for March
February wasn’t as productive as I had hoped, at least not for my “bookclub reading”. I had 28 from book clubs below as potential reads, but my Christmas present hangover reads occupied most of my attention, plus some non-reading projects. Oh, and life itself, I guess. I read This Book Made Me Think of You (2026) – BR00300 (R2026) – 🐸🐸🐸🐸🐸 and as you can see, it was excellent. I also read Two Bodies Are Better Than One by Erica Ruth Neubauer (2026) – BR00301 (R2026) – 🐸⚪⚪⚪⚪and it was NOT a good choice. I was going to pitch it at several points and it was a train wreck. Wow. Just wow. So +1 point for Reader’s Digest for the year, -1 for Amazon First Reads.
Let’s take a look at options for March…out of 93 possible books suggested by book clubs, I decided on:
- Yes (13):
- The Last Labyrinth, Gwendolyn Womack
- This Story Might Save Your Life, Tiffany Crum
- Her Hidden Fire, Cliodhna O’Sullivan
- The Drowning Woman, Robyn Harding
- The Burning Library, Gilly Macmillan
- Blood & Roses, Callie Hart
- The Searcher, Tana French
- Sun-Kissed Cooking, Brooke Williamson
- La Belle Sauvage, Philip Pullman
- Innocent Guilt, Remi Kone
- The Frozen People, Elly Griffiths
- In Time With You, Kristin Dwyer
- Death at the Sign of the Rook, Kate Atkinson
- Maybe (5):
- What Happened Next, Edwin Hill
- Almost Life, Kiran Milwood Hargrave
- More Than Enough, Anna Quindlen
- The Scene of the Crime, Lynda La Plante
- Wolf Hour, Jo Nesbo
- No (75):
- 58 decided as no
- 17 had no info available for March as of March 7
- ** Updated March 15 **
- My Grandfather, the Master Detective, Masateru Konishi
- How To Get Away With Murder, Rebecca Philipson
- To The End of Reckoning, Joseph Moldover
- Once and Again, Rebecca Serle
- The Shakespeare Secret, D.J. Nix
| Book Club | Book title & author | Brief Description | Yes/no for me |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amazon First Reads | The Price of Honey, Liane Moriarty | Wife sits with three ex-wives at tech mogul’s funeral (SS) | NO |
| As Far As She Knew, Diana Awad | Arab husband dies, had unknown second house, why? | NO | |
| In the Great Quiet, Laura Vogt | Okholahoma land rush, independent woman alone with potentially violent past | NO | |
| Yours Always, Corinne Sullivan | Old lover with missing ex-gf, dating apps, intrigue | NO | |
| No Place to Be Single, Felicia Kingsley | Childhood friends reunite in small Tuscany village, but he is modern businessman and she is relaxed vintner | NO | |
| What Happened Next, Edwin Hill | Long ago, Father stabbed man and wounded Mother, now son wants to know why | MAYBE | |
| Maybe It’s Fate, Heidi McLaughlin | Woman drops current life to take care of distant friend’s kids when friend dies, romance ensues | NO | |
| The Last Labyrinth, Gwendolyn Womack | Outlander + Merlin’s sister, and music | YES | |
| Whispers of Ink and Starlight, Garrett Curbow | Character of ink come to life, escapes her origin story | NO | |
| Audacious | Tell Me How You Eat, Amber Husain | How and why we eat | NO |
| Barnes & Noble | Lake Effect, Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney | Sexual awakening in ’77 with consequences for teenage daughter when adult | NO |
| BBC Radio 2 ** Updated March 15 ** | Minbak, Ela Lee | South Korean family generational story | NO |
| Belletrist ** Updated March 15 ** | The Valley of Vengeful Ghosts, Kim Fu | Mother dies, daughter buys house in valley, flood comes with ghosts | NO |
| Black Men Read | Temple Folk, Aaliyah Bilal | Fictional challenges of faith and action for Black Muslim Americans | NO |
| Book of the Month | Love Is An Algorithm, Laura Brooke Robson | Can an app manage your relationship? | NO |
| Almost Life, Kiran Milwood Hargrave | Brokeback Mountain, but with women in Paris | MAYBE | |
| Lady Tremaine, Rachel Hochhauser | Cinderella elsewhere on page | NO | |
| This Story Might Save Your Life, Tiffany Crum | Survival podcaster goes missing, cohost is suspect | YES | |
| Kin, Tayari Jones | Motherless daughters, elsewhere on page | NO | |
| Everyday Reading Book Club | Project Hail Mary, Andy Weir | Save the world by finding aliens | NO, already read, nowhere near as good as Martian |
| Good Housekeeping | Wait for Me, Amy Jo Burns | Young folk singer debuted and vanished, another longs for story | NO |
| Good Morning America | The Secret Lives of Murderers’ Wives, Elizabeth Arnott | The wives of three killers try to find a current killer | NO |
| Good Morning America: YA | Her Hidden Fire, Cliodhna O’Sullivan | Servant uses her magic to fake her master’s abilities | YES |
| Good Reads (Mystery, Crime, Thriller Group) | The Girl On The Train, Paula Hawkins | Girl sees something while commuting | NO, already on list |
| The Drowning Woman, Robyn Harding | Rich woman wants help to disappear | YES | |
| I Care About Books | Tuesdays with Morrie, Mitch Albom | Man visits dying man on Tuesdays | NO, already read |
| Jack Carr | n/a | ||
| Anthony Jeselnik | Mother Night, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. | Nazi on trial in Israel | NO |
| Jewish Book Council: NF | Anti-semitism, an American Tradition, Pamela S. Nadell | History from New Amsterdam to present | NO |
| Jewish Book Council: F | The Anatomy of Exile, Zeeva Bukai | Jewish, Israel, Palestinian relations between two families now in US | NO |
| Katie Couric | More Than Enough, Anna Quindlen | DNA test upends woman’s life with her book club friends | MAYBE |
| Late Show ** Updated March 15 ** | This Is Not About Us, Allegra Goodman | Two estranged sisters | NO |
| Library Science | n/a but now has February: I Want To Show You More, Jamie Quatro | Diverse set of SSs | NO |
| Main Street Reads – Fab Fantasy | The Dragon Keeper, Robin Hobb | First book in series — dragons have returned | NO, maybe future read |
| MSR – Thrill in the ‘ville | The Burning Library, Gilly Macmillan | Two secret societies of women battle for old power | YES |
| MSR – Kids | Alice With A Why, Anna James | Modern version of Alice in Wonderland | NO |
| MSR – Kiss & Tell Romance | Blood & Roses, Callie Hart | Low-level mobster draws the line at trafficking in girls, with spice | YES |
| MSR – Books & Banter | The Pohaku, Jasmin Iolani Hakes | Hawai’i’s history | NO |
| Mindy’s Book Studio | n/a nothing for March but April is out | ||
| Mocha Girls Read ** Updated March 15 ** | Dirty Laundry, Disha Bose | Three mothers, one’s dead, everyone’s a suspect | NO |
| Natalie Portman | The Beginning Comes After the End, Rebecca Solnit | Changes have come to world PoV | NO |
| Native American | n/a | ||
| Oprah 2.0 | n/a but February is now out: Kin, Tayari Jones | 2 motherless Black friends with different lives | NO |
| PBS Book Readers | n/a | ||
| Poisoned Pen – Cozy Crimes ** Updated March 15 ** | My Grandfather, the Master Detective, Masateru Konish | School teacher consults grandfather in solving crimes | YES |
| PP – Croak and Dagger | The Searcher, Tana French | Ex-cop looking for quiet in Ireland gets convinced to look for a kid’s missing brother | YES |
| PP – Cookbook | Sun-Kissed Cooking, Brooke Williamson | Veggies | YES |
| PP – British Crime ** Updated March 15 ** | How To Get Away With Murder, Rebecca Philipson | Scotland Yard chases self-help guru | YES |
| PP – First Mystery ** Updated March 15 ** | To The End of Reckoning, Joseph Moldover | Traumatic brain injury father, supportive son with love interest whose father is missing | YES |
| PP – Crime Collectors ** Updated March 15 ** | Her Last Breath, Taylor Adams | Woman goes caving with best friend, meets hostile stranger | NO |
| PP – Historical ** Updated March 15 ** | Daughter of Egypt, Marie Benedict | Modern archaeologist, strong female leader in past | NO |
| PP – Notable new fiction ** Updated March 15 ** | Once and Again, Rebecca Serle | Women in family have ability to turn back time to undo something | YES |
| PP – Hardboiled/noir | Somebody’s Done For, David Goodis | Boat capsizes but found by reluctant Samaritan crooks | NO |
| PP – Noir 2 ** Updated March 15 ** | From the Dust, David Swinson | Retired cop, dead body | NO |
| PP – Romance ** Updated March 15 ** | Second Chance Duet, Ana Holguin | Work and live together with old nemesis | NO |
| PP – Historical ** Updated March 15 ** | The Shakespeare Secret, D.J. Nix | Three women write plays and hire Shakespeare as a beard | YES |
| PP – SciFi | The Eye of the World, Robert Jordan | Start of giant series, excellent fantasy but way too many characters | NO, already read |
| Read with Jenna | Wait for Me, Amy Jo Burns | Folk singer, already above | NO |
| Reader’s Digest | Warning Signs, Tracy Sierra | Wilderness thriller, boy with father clients, and a creature | NO |
| Reddit /BookClub | Mini: Stitched To Skin Like Family Is, Nghi Vo | Chinese migrant can hear stories from the clothes she sews, the violence that went before | NO |
| Poetry: n/a | |||
| Any: The Correspondent, Virginia Evans | Importance of writing letters | NO | |
| PubDom: Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackery | Satire of Victorian England’s social and economic ways | NO | |
| World 1: The Mabinogion, Sioned Davies | Welsh medieval history stories | NO | |
| World 2: The Blue Book of Nego, Manon Steffan Ros | Post-nuclear war in Wales | NO | |
| Evergreen: The Secret History, Donna Tartt | Academic lifestyle beliefs go wrong | NO | |
| Discovery 1: The Birds and Other Stories, Daphne du Maurier | SS of chilling experiences | NO | |
| Discovery 2: Dark Tales, Shirley Jackson | SS, scary | NO | |
| MOD: The Constant Rabbit, Jasper Fforde | Full size rabbits living among us | NO | |
| Runner-up: The Alice Network, Kate Quinn | Ex-spy + pregnant socialite team up to find out what happened to a cousin | NO, already on list for future | |
| Bonus: Golden Fool, Robin Hobb | Intrigue in a king’s court | NO | |
| Bonus: Odyssey, Homer | The tale of a journey | NO | |
| Bonus: Tender Cruelty, Katee Robert | The gods are at war in Olympus and Hera is conflicted | NO, future read | |
| Bonus: Brimstone, Callie Hart | Second book in Fae and Alchemy series | NO, future read | |
| Evergreen: The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde | Faustian bargain for eternal youth and beauty | NO | |
| MOD: Remarkably Bright Creatures, Shelby Van Pelt | Aquarium worker, sentient octupus also a detective | NO | |
| Bonus: The Silver Chair, C.S. Lewis | Rescuing the prince | NO, old read | |
| Bonus: La Belle Sauvage, Philip Pullman | Boy protecting a small girl, a magnet for power and magic | YES | |
| Bonus: Heretics of Dune, Frank Herbert | Book 5, Lost Ones are returning home | NO, future read | |
| Bonus: The Eye of The Bedlam Bride, Matt Dinniman | Book 6 of Dungeon Crawler Carl series | NO, maybe future read | |
| Reese | Lady Tremaine, Rachel Hotchhauser | Cinderella, if stepmother wasn’t evil | NO |
| Richard and Judy (Spring picks) | The Day I Lost You, Ruth Mancini | Two mothers, loss, and one child left | NO |
| Innocent Guilt, Remi Kone | Woman walks into police station with bloody bat, but won’t speak, dead man in park | YES | |
| The Scene of the Crime, Lynda La Plante | CSI: London, new police unit | MAYBE | |
| Wolf Hour, Jo Nesbo | Serial killer in 2016, case history in 2022 | MAYBE | |
| Swept Away, Beth O’Leary | One night stand drifts out to sea | NO | |
| The Great Alone, Kristin Hannah | Vietnam vet returns home, can’t cope, takes family to Alaska wilderness | NO | |
| Secret Chapter Mystery (Cumberland) | The Frozen People, Elly Griffiths | Time-travelling detectives | YES |
| Service 95 | Bad Feminist, Roxane Gay | Biography/essays on culture | NO |
| Stacks Book Club | Paradise, Toni Morrison | Mass violence event | NO |
| Sunnie Reads | In Time With You, Kristin Dwyer | “Groundhog Year”, mystical do-over to save boyfriend | YES |
| Sunriver – Fiction | There Are Rivers In The Sky, Elif Shafak | Water as metaphor for history | NO |
| Sunriver – Mystery | Death at the Sign of the Rook, Kate Atkinson | Recover a stolen painting | YES |
| TeaTime | Diorama, Carol Bensimon | One Brazilian congressman kills another, daughter wonders years later | NO |
| Zibby’s Book Club | This Is Not About Us, Allegra Goodman | Two estranged sisters | NO |
FYI: Yellow code: #FFFFE0
I like Tara French, Kate Quinn and both the Moriarity sisters. Don’t recall time travelling in Elly Griffiths stories, protagonist is an archeology professor.
I read summaries in Sparks Notes this month and picked several to get from classics I haven’t read or read long ago. Discovered I am not into Hemmingway’s stream of consciousness style. Reading and enjoying Mashiko Ayama in translation from Japanese found by Chris, charming novellas.
Hidey ho, The Elly Griffiths is a new series I guess, starting with the Frozen People. Normally they go back a few years (apparently) for simple cold cases, but now they’re going back to the 1800s.
I’ll have to add Mashiko Ayama to the possibilities…