For anyone who can’t look away from a juicy literary scandal.
A young writer bases his novel on a friend’s life and must deal with the fallout.
Caleb Horowitz, a 27-year-old Brooklynite, works for a financial services startup, but he believes he’s on the verge of another life: that of a famous novelist. He’s just been offered representation by one of the biggest agents in New York, and he’s about to sell his book. His family and friends think it’s a novel he wrote during a sabbatical from the city in Gainesville, Florida, but Caleb knows the truth: He failed to write something “publishable” in Gainesville and instead took a chaotic cross-country trip searching for the next stage of his life. Crashing with a college friend named Avi, Caleb stumbled across that next stage by accident when Avi told him a wild story, a version of which he’d turned into a sketch of a story himself, and Caleb decided to appropriate it. Caleb rented a room, holed up, and feverishly finished a novel based on Avi’s narrative. Afterward, he returned to New York, took a job at the startup, and worked on finding an agent; what he doesn’t realize is that, in the intervening months, Avi also moved there and has started a new job himself…as an editorial assistant at a big New York publisher. When the manuscript comes across Avi’s desk, Caleb is forced to strike a deal that throws into sharp relief some thorny dilemmas about art, ethics, and what being a writer really means. Lipstein wittily captures all the savagery of the publishing industry, from Goodreads reviews to awkward author photos. But for all the metafictional layers here, at its heart this is a surprisingly traditional, almost Dickensian, story about the vagaries of fate.
For anyone who can’t look away from a juicy literary scandal.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-3746-0270-3
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
SEEN & HEARD
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.
A French art historian’s English-language fiction debut combines the story of a loving relationship between a grandfather and granddaughter with an enlightening discussion of art.
One day, when 10-year-old Mona removes the necklace given to her by her now-dead grandmother, she experiences a frightening, hour-long bout of blindness. Her parents take her to the doctor, who gives her a variety of tests and also advises that she see a psychiatrist. Her grandfather Henry tells her parents that he will take care of that assignment, but instead, he takes Mona on weekly visits to either the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay, or the Centre Pompidou, where each week they study a single work of art, gazing at it deeply and then discussing its impact and history and the biography of its maker. For the reader’s benefit, Schlesser also describes each of the works in scrupulous detail. As the year goes on, Mona faces the usual challenges of elementary school life and the experiences of being an only child, and slowly begins to understand the causes of her temporary blindness. Primarily an amble through a few dozen of Schlesser’s favorite works of art—some well known and others less so, from Botticelli and da Vinci through Basquiat and Bourgeois—the novel would probably benefit from being read at a leisurely pace. While the dialogue between Henry and the preternaturally patient and precocious Mona sometimes strains credulity, readers who don’t have easy access to the museums of Paris may enjoy this vicarious trip in the company of a guide who focuses equally on that which can be seen and the context that can’t be. Come for the novel, stay for the introductory art history course.
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2025
ISBN: 9798889661115
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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