A wild ride with entertainers serving during WWII.
O’Connor’s historical novel highlights the “Jeep shows” that entertained soldiers during World War II.
Jim Tanzer (based on the real-life Jim Hetzer) is a song-and-dance man who enlists in the military to fight in WWII. He’s quickly assigned to the Morale Corps at Camp Sibert. “You’ll be entertaining combat soldiers in places where the USO can’t go,” his captain tells him. One of his fellow enlisted men is Mickey Rooney (who actually was in the Morale Corps during the war). They are two among a cast of more than 50 in a show called Hip Hooraythat travels to New York and London before it’s disbanded in favor of “Jeep shows,” in which teams made up of one driver and two performers are sent out in a Jeep to perform for the troops. Jim, Mickey, and their friend Wes are one such team traveling to various battlegrounds, including the Ardennes and the famed Battle of the Bulge. The action hops back and forth in time, providing readers with depictions of an 11-year-old Jimmy’s introduction to vaudeville and his relationship with his wife, Stella. It seems odd to call a World War II novel “delightful,” but that’s exactly what you get with O’Connor’s mix of history and fiction as battles rage on and enlisted men entertain the troops. The narrative covers a wide swath, from drama onboard ships to dealing with nasty weather to, of course, the travails of the injured (including Jim) and the dead during the war. It’s a fascinating look at a part of the military that many folks probably have never heard of. The characters, both real and imagined, are well drawn, and the author has a knack for dialogue that rings true. There’s also humor, thanks in no small part to Rooney’s presence. The interjection of real-life characters, particularly Rooney, isn’t jarring; in fact, it serves as a useful reminder that Jim Hetzer was a very real person. This is a compelling mix of showbiz and war, laughter and tears—a fine line that O’Connor walks well.
A wild ride with entertainers serving during WWII.Pub Date: Nov. 21, 2024
ISBN: 9780990888451
Page Count: 348
Publisher: OKPI Publishing
Review Posted Online: Nov. 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An affecting portrait of a prickly woman.
A lifetime’s worth of letters combine to portray a singular character.
Sybil Van Antwerp, a cantankerous but exceedingly well-mannered septuagenarian, is the titular correspondent in Evans’ debut novel. Sybil has retired from a beloved job as chief clerk to a judge with whom she had previously been in private legal practice. She is the divorced mother of two living adult children and one who died when he was 8. She is a reader of novels, a gardener, and a keen observer of human nature. But the most distinguishing thing about Sybil is her lifelong practice of letter writing. As advancing vision problems threaten Sybil’s carefully constructed way of life—in which letters take the place of personal contact and engagement—she must reckon with unaddressed issues from her past that threaten the house of cards (letters, really) she has built around herself. Sybil’s relationships are gradually revealed in the series of letters sent to and received from, among others, her brother, sister-in-law, children, former work associates, and, intriguingly, literary icons including Joan Didion and Larry McMurtry. Perhaps most affecting is the series of missives Sybil writes but never mails to a shadowy figure from her past. Thoughtful musings on the value and immortal quality of letters and the written word populate one of Sybil’s notes to a young correspondent while other messages are laugh-out-loud funny, tinged with her characteristic blunt tartness. Evans has created a brusque and quirky yet endearing main character with no shortage of opinions and advice for others but who fails to excavate the knotty difficulties of her own life. As Sybil grows into a delayed self-awareness, her letters serve as a chronicle of fitful growth.
An affecting portrait of a prickly woman.Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9780593798430
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2025
A debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.
A high school senior pursues an affair with her teacher.
Seventeen-year-old Waldo, the narrator of McCurdy’s fiction debut, lives in Anchorage, Alaska, with her mother, though she’s long been the parent in their relationship. She heats her own frozen meals and pays the bills on time while her mom chases man after man and makes well-meaning promises she never keeps. Waldo blows her Victoria’s Secret wages on online shopping sprees and binges on junk food, inevitably crashing after the fleeting highs of her indulgences. Mr. Korgy, her creative writing teacher, has “thinning hair and nose pores”; he’s 40 years old and married with a child. Nevertheless—or possibly as a result?—Waldo’s attraction to him is “instant. So sudden it’s alarming. So palpable it’s confusing.” Mr. Korgy professes to want to keep their friendship aboveboard, but after a sexual encounter at the school’s winter formal that she initiates, an affair begins. Will this reckless pursuit be the one that actually satisfies Waldo, and is she as mature as she thinks she is? Waldo is a keen observer of people and provides sharp commentary on the punishing work of female beauty. Readers of McCurdy’s bestselling memoir, I’m Glad My Mom Died (2022), will surely be curious about the tumultuous mother-daughter relationship, and it is one of the novel’s highlights, full of realistic pity and anger and need. (“I want to scream at her. I want her to hug me.”) Unfortunately, the prose is often unwieldy and sometimes downright cringeworthy: When Waldo tells Mr. Korgy she loves him, “The words hang in the air in that constipated way they do when you know that you shouldn’t have said them.” Waldo frequently lists emotions and adjectives in triplicate, and events that could be significant aren’t sufficiently explored or given enough space to breathe before the novel races on to the next thing.
A debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2026
ISBN: 9780593723739
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
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