A brooding and somewhat meandering novel about growing older and, ideally, wiser.
An aging gay man is caught between love and death in Shapiro’s first novel.
Two years ago, in 2019, Andrew moved from Paris to Florida to be near his elderly, ailing father, Charles. His sister, the thrice-divorced Sheila, also lives in the area, and the two share the responsibilities of looking after the old man now that their mother has died. Andrew isn’t exactly content to be there, as he’s increasingly aware of his own middle age, at 56, and the fact that moving from the City of Light to “a small town in a refurbished swampland in Florida, where he’d only made obligatory annual family visits, hardly fell in the natural order of things.” Then he meets a much younger man on the beach whose beauty and sense of hopefulness suddenly make Andrew feel young again. Twenty-three-year-old Ex—short for Alexander—is at first merely a source of lustful fascination for Andrew; then the two begin to connect on unexpected levels. As Charles’ condition worsens and hurricane season bears down on the Florida coast, Andrew learns that Ex may be a bit more complicated—and difficult—than he initially realized. Shapiro’s prose is lucid and philosophical, often zeroing in on Andrew’s anxieties and dark humor, as in this passage, in which Andrew analyzes his fear of his father’s moving in with him: “This ‘coming full circle’ or ‘closing the loop’ thing—the aging, diminished parent returns, like a child, to his child, to be soothed and coddled—horrified and repulsed Andrew, with its under- and over-tones of slow agonizing deterioration and absence of dignity. It also struck him as a supreme inconvenience.” The author effectively reinforces the problem of time by narrating the book’s three sections in the past, present, and future tenses, respectively. The plot moves quite slowly, and at 302 pages, the novel is perhaps longer than it needs to be to explore its themes. Even so, Shapiro manages to convincingly capture a man at a pivotal moment in life, when generations shift and new patterns emerge.
A brooding and somewhat meandering novel about growing older and, ideally, wiser.Pub Date: July 31, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-79525-511-0
Page Count: 302
Publisher: Independently Published
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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 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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