A lively and beguiling tale that depicts a world no one should wish to live in.
An elusive, centrifugal story of a grim near future that might stop George Orwell in his tracks.
Breton, who shares a name with the noted surrealist, is schizophrenic, locked away in a psych ward but with the uncanny ability to see distant events out on the edge of a city that might as well be the East Berlin of old—or a dark, rainy version of a Tibetan bardo. The city is ruled by the Party, which would seem to be in steep decline, even if the downtrodden proles won’t admit that awful truth: “It’ll last till the bitter end,” says one old woman. (Even the young in French author Volodine’s tale are preternaturally aged.) “We’ll all be dead and buried to a man and the Party will still be there.” So, too, will Monroe, a member of the inner circle executed years earlier but somehow returned to life, as are the girls of the title, fierce fighters with names like Lilia Adouldjamani, Mirka Goldenberg, and Mariana Magadane—and the love of Breton’s life, Rebecca Rausch, who died 30 years earlier and yet stalks the streets, armed to the teeth. The chief difference between the living and the dead is that the dead swear more, and Rebecca in particular hurls F-bombs like grenades (“Fuck!…I was just born, the night is young, and already my feet are frozen!”). Alive or dead, Rebecca makes for a fine revolutionary, demanding that the masses “approve a new direction for the Party, now restructured under Monroe’s leadership, and to finish the great cleansing of the cowards, bureaucrats, opportunists, and traitors by hunting them down in their dens or by exposing them if they were disguised as hospital workers, hybrid creatures, or patients.” Alas, things don’t work out quite to plan, especially when Monroe himself returns to add more mayhem to an already chaotic narrative.
A lively and beguiling tale that depicts a world no one should wish to live in.Pub Date: March 17, 2026
ISBN: 9781962770552
Page Count: 278
Publisher: Archipelago
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
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
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.
A falsely accused Black man goes into hiding in this masterful novella by Wright (1908-1960), finally published in full.
Written in 1941 and '42, between Wright’s classics Native Son and Black Boy, this short novel concerns Fred Daniels, a modest laborer who’s arrested by police officers and bullied into signing a false confession that he killed the residents of a house near where he was working. In a brief unsupervised moment, he escapes through a manhole and goes into hiding in a sewer. A series of allegorical, surrealistic set pieces ensues as Fred explores the nether reaches of a church, a real estate firm, and a jewelry store. Each stop is an opportunity for Wright to explore themes of hope, greed, and exploitation; the real estate firm, Wright notes, “collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent from poor colored folks.” But Fred’s deepening existential crisis and growing distance from society keep the scenes from feeling like potted commentaries. As he wallpapers his underground warren with cash, mocking and invalidating the currency, he registers a surrealistic but engrossing protest against divisive social norms. The novel, rejected by Wright’s publisher, has only appeared as a substantially truncated short story until now, without the opening setup and with a different ending. Wright's take on racial injustice seems to have unsettled his publisher: A note reveals that an editor found reading about Fred’s treatment by the police “unbearable.” That may explain why Wright, in an essay included here, says its focus on race is “rather muted,” emphasizing broader existential themes. Regardless, as an afterword by Wright’s grandson Malcolm attests, the story now serves as an allegory both of Wright (he moved to France, an “exile beyond the reach of Jim Crow and American bigotry”) and American life. Today, it resonates deeply as a story about race and the struggle to envision a different, better world.
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-59853-676-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Library of America
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK TO SCREEN
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