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
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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