A quietly affecting novel of the refugee experience.
In Tuon’s novel, a boy escapes the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia with his family and comes of age in America, where he becomes a writer.
Samnang Sok is 5 when his family flees Cambodia’s Communist dictatorship in 1979, but he was only about 3 when his mother died, unable to receive treatment because “there were no doctors and nurses under Pol Pot.” This tragedy, along with the execution of two uncles and multiple episodes of starvation, causes his family—led by his grandmother, Lok-Yeay, and grandfather, Lok-Ta—to make the difficult decision to leave their home.They head first to a United Nations refugee camp in Thailand, which has its own horrors, including an attack by Khmer Rouge soldiers that forces the family to hide in a communal toilet; however, they’re eventually sponsored for entry into Massachusetts. Samnang’s childhood there is far from idyllic—his family is constantly working to get by, and his cousins are the only Cambodian children he knows. He faces nearly constant racism and never truly feels at ease in America until he moves to Long Beach, California’s diverse community. His desire to “take the language that is not given to [him] at birth [English], possess it, INFECT it with [his] presence, my history, [his] voice, and hurl it back” drives him to become a writer, which he uses to tell his own story. Tuon effectively uses this framework throughout the novel—no matter how long Samnang spends in the United States, he can’t leave his Cambodian roots behind, and he deeply understands that he doesn’t want to do so. Indeed, the novel opens with Samnang asking his maternal relatives to tell him about his mother; he’s eager to know more about his parents, whose “absence had always been a haunting presence in [his] life.” The overall tone of the novel is straightforwardly memoiristic; Samnang relates his experiences primarily chronologically and includes additional information only as he learns it from later interviews, giving the work—which closely mirrors events from the author’s own life—a sense of verisimilitude.
A quietly affecting novel of the refugee experience.Pub Date: Aug. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780810147430
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Curbstone Books 2
Review Posted Online: Oct. 24, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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