Altogether extraordinary: a masterwork of modern Middle Eastern literature deserving the widest possible audience.
Superbly realized novel of life, death, and what lies between.
Muzafar-i Subhdam has had a rough time of it in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, imprisoned for 21 years. Now he is free—but not really, since his friend and fellow Kurdish soldier Yaqub-i Snawbar is keeping him captive “inside a large mansion, within a sequestered forest” while a plague rages outside. (Ali’s novel was first published in 2002, so it’s not the plague we know.) Besides, Yaqub adds ominously, “You’re dead....You don’t exist.” Muzafar has forgotten everything about the world except his son, Saryas-i Subhdam, whose life is a series of encounters with danger. Blending magical realism with dark fables worthy of Kafka, Kurdish novelist Ali spins episodes that require the willing suspension of disbelief while richly rewarding that surrender. One narrative strand concerns young Muhammad the Glass-Hearted, a friend of Saryas', who falls in love with a woman who might well be a djinn or ghost: Muhammad dies, brokenhearted, and she visits his grave, there to find that Muhammad is surrounded by many friends killed during clashes with Saddam’s forces. At least Muhammad lived long enough to see, with Saryas, a mysterious place where a head decapitated by Saddam’s security agents reunites with its body and nourishes the pomegranate tree of the title. Muhammad may be too sensitive for his own good, but he knows the meaning of that tree, proclaiming that it belongs to everyone: “A real father plants for all the children in the world, for all those who come after him.” Alas, so many of those children are doomed: One horrific moment comes in a boys home full of victims of bombings and land mines, armless and legless, “strange beings you wouldn’t see anywhere else,” deathly silent. Muzafar’s search for his son never ends; nor, Ali writes in magnificent summation, does his haunting story, “this tale of glass boys living in a glass time in a glass country.”
Altogether extraordinary: a masterwork of modern Middle Eastern literature deserving the widest possible audience.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2023
ISBN: 978-1953861-40-5
Page Count: 321
Publisher: Archipelago
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2022
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 dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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