An engaging coming-of-age tale that meticulously examines its audacious protagonist.
A debut novel follows a man who endures personal loss and racial discrimination as a devoted parent, CIA agent, and university professor.
As a person of color growing up in 1950s America, David Walton is no stranger to racism. In high school, his paper on buffalo soldiers results in his teacher accusing him of plagiarism, merely due to her ignorance of the subject. But his intellect scores the teenager a job at an engineering firm. It’s also the reason he becomes an intelligence analyst in the Army as well as an analyst and field operative later for the CIA. In the meantime, David falls for Valerie Olephant, and they have two sons together. He’s a dedicated father, though his relationship with Valerie sadly doesn’t last. David’s CIA work, pairing him with mathematician Ken Carle, can be dangerous, like their assignment to thwart whoever is intercepting money and weapons shipments intended for Sudanese rebels. In subsequent years, David earns a doctorate in psychology and becomes a university professor. He also falls in love with Ann Hickman, a romance complicated by her husband, Philip, whose company, Tremont Pharmaceutical, is responsible for the antidepressant drug David believes killed a loved one. Grey skillfully builds a stable foundation for the characters, especially David, with an occasional focus on Ken and Philip as well. The smart, deliberately paced prose gradually molds David into a stalwart, likable hero. He suffers racism, but the story covers all aspects of his life, including playing baseball in high school and aiming to break a home run record. While David’s CIA mission involves an arms dealer and a potential mole, this espionage subplot showcases skilled operatives and, therefore, offers minimal suspense. Still, David unflinchingly faces myriad obstacles in the engrossing novel; his affair with Ann, rather than being titillating, becomes a troubling love story.
An engaging coming-of-age tale that meticulously examines its audacious protagonist. (author bio)Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-64654-049-5
Page Count: 276
Publisher: Fulton Books
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2020
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 debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.
A high school senior pursues an affair with her teacher.
Seventeen-year-old Waldo, the narrator of McCurdy’s fiction debut, lives in Anchorage, Alaska, with her mother, though she’s long been the parent in their relationship. She heats her own frozen meals and pays the bills on time while her mom chases man after man and makes well-meaning promises she never keeps. Waldo blows her Victoria’s Secret wages on online shopping sprees and binges on junk food, inevitably crashing after the fleeting highs of her indulgences. Mr. Korgy, her creative writing teacher, has “thinning hair and nose pores”; he’s 40 years old and married with a child. Nevertheless—or possibly as a result?—Waldo’s attraction to him is “instant. So sudden it’s alarming. So palpable it’s confusing.” Mr. Korgy professes to want to keep their friendship aboveboard, but after a sexual encounter at the school’s winter formal that she initiates, an affair begins. Will this reckless pursuit be the one that actually satisfies Waldo, and is she as mature as she thinks she is? Waldo is a keen observer of people and provides sharp commentary on the punishing work of female beauty. Readers of McCurdy’s bestselling memoir, I’m Glad My Mom Died (2022), will surely be curious about the tumultuous mother-daughter relationship, and it is one of the novel’s highlights, full of realistic pity and anger and need. (“I want to scream at her. I want her to hug me.”) Unfortunately, the prose is often unwieldy and sometimes downright cringeworthy: When Waldo tells Mr. Korgy she loves him, “The words hang in the air in that constipated way they do when you know that you shouldn’t have said them.” Waldo frequently lists emotions and adjectives in triplicate, and events that could be significant aren’t sufficiently explored or given enough space to breathe before the novel races on to the next thing.
A debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2026
ISBN: 9780593723739
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2026 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.
