This month’s selection is a debut that is already making its mark, shortlisted for the 2025 Women’s Prize for Fiction (keep an eye out for the winner in June!) and buzzing its way up ‘best of the year’ lists. But Good Girl by Aria Aber is fresh to our shores and it turns out we loved it just as much as everyone else. 

This is a coming-of-age novel with all the trimmings. Aber explores identity and exile, xenophobia, and belonging, all against the backdrop of Berlin’s raucous nightlife and a post-9/11 Germany. It’s messy, confusing, and transformative—all the things growing up has always been. 

Our protagonist–19-year-old aspiring photographer Nila–attempts to make sense of her Muslim girlhood and depart from the legacy of her immigrant family by diving into the experimental techno subculture of Germany. 

It is here, amongst the thrill of lust and drug use she becomes entangled in a complex relationship with an older American writer, Marlowe Woods. Nila learns that in order to make sense of her Afghan-German heritage, she must embrace it. As readers, we’re invited not just to observe her unraveling and rebirth, but to reckon with our own.

Aber’s mastery of language is clear; not only is she an award-winning poet, she’s also tackled Good Girl in her third language—not the Farsi or German she was raised speaking, but English—, a fact that is deeply impressive to our monolingual team. 

We hope you love it as much as we did.