An impressively well-turned story about how environmental damage creeps into our bodies, psyches, and economies.
Big business, protesters, and working-class loggers clash in this environmentally savvy debut.
Davidson’s novel takes place in Northern California forest territory between 1977 and 1978, as Rich Gundersen, a fourth-generation logger, is poised to make a big profit: He’s just purchased a stretch of land full of old-growth redwoods whose sale could provide security for his family, which is smaller than he’d like; he and his wife, Colleen, have one son, Graham (nicknamed Chub), but as the story opens she’s just had another in a string of miscarriages. Other crises soon emerge. Anti-logging protesters are trying to halt work and are suspected of having left a child’s skull in the forest to prompt an investigation. Colleen, a midwife, witnesses an increase in stillbirths, many with serious deformations. Daniel, a researcher and Colleen’s ex-boyfriend, suspects chemicals sprayed by the timber company are responsible, but any delay to investigate threatens Rich’s plans to cut down and sell the redwoods. Davidson researched this milieu deeply but with an eye toward making every discovery feel natural and unforced. By shifting perspectives among Rich, Colleen, and Chub, she reveals not just the conflicts among loggers, protesters, and companies, but the growing stress within the family. The family of Colleen’s sister, Enid, whose husband is working an illicit tree-poaching scam, adds another layer of tension. (And Colleen can’t help but resent that Enid’s brood is ever growing: “Enid uncrosses her legs for two minutes and a baby pops out.”) As thoughtfully as Davidson establishes these dilemmas, she’s equally skilled at writing an outdoorsy adventure novel in which logging threatens the lives of workers with snapped cables and everybody else via landslides. Thematically, it’s a strong work of climate fiction, but it's rooted in age-old man-versus-nature storytelling.
An impressively well-turned story about how environmental damage creeps into our bodies, psyches, and economies.Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-982144-40-1
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
PERSPECTIVES
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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