Fans of Jenny Offill and Rachel Cusk will enjoy this unusual work of personal mythology.
The daughter of two deaf parents explores her identity in a shape-shifting work straddling the boundaries of genre.
Durastanti, a noted Italian writer born in Brooklyn, formulates her first novel as a series of autobiographical and philosophical vignettes organized by theme: Family, Travels, Health, Work & Money, Love, and What's Your Sign. The often whimsical subheadings include "The Girl Absent for Dizzy Spells" and "The Love That Would Not End for Another Eighteen Years, If It Ever Did, Began." While the beginning of the book focuses on her parents' origins and the final sections on her own experience of couple-hood as an adult, the book is resolutely nonlinear; the author confides in an afterword that she would have loved to have every copy printed with a different chapter sequence. "But is it a true story?" is a question first posed by the narrator's mother, who "hates fiction" and "believes The Exorcist is a realist masterpiece," and it returns repeatedly right up until the last sentence of the book. Who can say? "It takes only a little misstep to slip out of a novel, to fall into an autobiography and resurface again as an essay, all in the short span of a sentence." The author's parents are romantic characters given to extremes—they met the day her father tried to jump off the Sisto Bridge in Trastevere, or possibly the day he saved her mother from two thieves who were kicking her and trying to yank away her purse. Growing up in a chaotic, confusing family between Brooklyn and rural southern Italy, the author and her older brother, who were never taught sign language, bonded intensely. "When I'm asked who taught me to speak properly...I realize the first language I spoke was that of the first person I loved: the Italian of a boy six years my senior." Further guideposts and socialization were provided by literature, cinema, and music: Last Exit to Brooklynwas "the book that changed everything...revealing all my insides," while in her adolescence, R.E.M's Automatic For the People was an alternative to a social life: "For some reason, sinking into a dimension of held-in breath, potential euthanasia, and men on the moon was comforting."
Fans of Jenny Offill and Rachel Cusk will enjoy this unusual work of personal mythology.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-08794-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2021
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
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
