The psychic impact of place—and its loss—goes deep in this blister of a novel.
End-times environmentalists tangle with the life force imperative.
The propulsively intelligent and reckless women who drive Watkins’ fiction arrive at middle age in Yellow Pine, Nevada, and the years are registering, for good and for ill. For her fourth book, Watkins names her chief protagonist Rose of Sharon after the character in The Grapes of Wrath. The story begins with Rose receiving a surprise call from Miles, a charismatic dude from two decades past, “who’d once poured salt on the slug of her heart.” Watkins uses the word “horny” in the first paragraph, and indeed this novel is enjoyably raunchy, with the midlife go-for-broke twist that the possibility of conception makes the sex hotter. Before the reader arrives there, however, a lot of “dry streams,” “drained lakes,” and “blasted valleys” must be crossed. Rose and a clutch of environmentalist friends are holding vigil for the once-public desert designated Yellow Pine, where the yucca and creosote are being pulped and the tortoises slaughtered for a 5,000-acre solar array. (This place, did, in fact, open in 2023 in the Mojave Desert outside Las Vegas.) Watkins marinates her novel in so much eco-dread, “like a penny dipped in some awful forever chemical,” that it becomes tough going, even though she writes exquisite, often funny prose. By midbook, when Miles is relentlessly schooled by the Yellow Pine protestors, it becomes close to unbearable—for him, and for the reader. It borders on histrionic, hammering home Watkins’ assertion that we are living “in a low-key failed state on a dying planet.” Still, those who persevere will be rewarded with a story that matches the growing maturity of its characters. Each has a wild list called “No Early Exits Mental Health Action Plan.” While Rose proclaims that “hope [is] for idiots and tourists,” this bracing book ends on a definite updraft. The whirlwind isn’t quite reaped yet.
The psychic impact of place—and its loss—goes deep in this blister of a novel.Pub Date: July 21, 2026
ISBN: 9798217045020
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2026
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
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
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