A winning clarion call for change set in Anytown, USA.
Kindness attempts to overcome hatred in a small red-state village in Chiddister’s novel.
The titular corner in Yellow Springs, Ohio, is where activists, largely elderly and Quaker, gather to protest the policies of the second Trump administration. At the center of the narrative is Olympia, an 81-year-old retired doctor who leads the protests against the divisions in her country, enflamed by Trump’s policies. In the book’s opening chapter, Olympia uses a tree limb to damage the pickup truck of one Howie Dewey, a Trump supporter who stops to break up the rally. Olympia’s life has been coming unraveled lately, making her more isolated. First, she lost her best friend, Laurie, to cancer. Later, her closest companion, her dog Lizzie, died of old age. Remaining in her orbit are Cary, a 90-year-old former lawyer who recently joined the protests, and Avery, a student who admires Olympia’s spirit. Drawing all these characters together is Claude, a jovial Haitian immigrant. Because of Trump’s draconian immigration crackdown, Claude and his extended family are at risk of being deported by ICE. Led by Olympia, the citizens, Quakers and non-Quakers alike, band together in a modern-day Underground Railroad, helping Claude and other Haitians obtain food and provisions and keeping them from the prying eyes of ICE. Their small individual contributions, although seemingly insignificant in the grand scheme of things, yield big results for those in need. Chiddister (One More Day, 2021) delivers a stark message: With the legislative and judicial branches of the U.S. government largely paralyzed, it’s up to the people themselves to battle oppression in whatever ways they can. With mainstream media hampered by new oligarchal leadership with their own agendas, the author suggests that those at the grassroots level must sound the alarm and push for change. Chiddister admirably features social outsiders as her messengers: lonely seniors, a timid student, a delivery man with a disabled sibling who’s barely scraping by. While none of these people can effect major national reform, they can push to improve life for those around them. Better yet, the author makes their constructive actions seem credible, not fantastical. In a nutshell, Chiddister has created an engaging, small-town tale of hope.
A winning clarion call for change set in Anytown, USA.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2026
ISBN: 9798901743676
Page Count: 204
Publisher: Atmosphere Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 10, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Fans of Stockett’s bestselling debut will love this engaging follow-up.
Stockett heads to Mississippi for another historical novel about feisty women.
This time, perhaps recalling criticisms of cultural appropriation in The Help (2009), she sticks to feisty white women, with one exception. The setting is Oxford in 1933. For two miserable years, 11-year-old Meg has lived in “the Orphan,” a county asylum for parentless girls. Chairlady Garnett—a villain so one-note she’d twirl a mustache if she had one—makes it her mission to ostracize the older girls she deems unadoptable, stigmatizing them as offspring of the “feebleminded” mothers who abandoned them. She particularly has it in for smart, sassy Meg, who refuses to believe her mother’s mysterious disappearance was deliberate. Elsewhere in Oxford, Birdie Calhoun comes to visit her sister Frances, who married a wealthy banker, to ask for money on behalf of their mother and grandmother back in Footely. Frances isn’t thrilled by this reminder of her impoverished small-town origins. But she’s trying to climb up in Oxford society by volunteering at the Orphan, the asylum’s books need to be done before the state inspector shows up in a few weeks, and Birdie is a bookkeeper. Having neatly arranged to keep Birdie in town and draw these two storylines together, Stockett goes on to spin a compulsively readable yarn with enough plot for a half-dozen novels. Birdie and Meg become friends, Meg is adopted despite Garnett’s best efforts, Meg’s mother turns up at the Orphan demanding to know where her child is—and that’s less than a quarter of the way through a long, winding narrative that keeps piling on more dramatic developments until all loose ends are neatly, if hastily, wrapped up in the final pages. Stockett might be making a point about Southern women facing facts and standing up for themselves, but mostly this is just a satisfyingly twisty tale that should make a great miniseries.
Fans of Stockett’s bestselling debut will love this engaging follow-up.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9781954118812
Page Count: 656
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
Simply charming.
A lovable gaggle of competitive quilters attempts to defy the odds.
The ladies of the Ogden Quilters Association are gearing up for another Simpton Family Quilting Extravaganza, and this year’s nationwide competition is extra special: It’s taking place just an hour away in Smithfield, Utah. For Betty Lou Dearden, OQA’s leader and most faithful member, who never misses a Wednesday quilting night and delights in reading the bylaws, this is a dream come true—a chance to put Utah quilting on the map. But beneath her bubbly surface, Betty Lou is struggling—longtime member Leera Smeeth has been passive aggressively shooting down Betty Lou’s ideas and attacking her sense of self for years (see: a particularly biting comment about her beloved peach bathroom); her children rarely visit; and her husband’s health is declining. And to top it off, OQA is down a member since Terry Blackfoot left following the oft-referenced but never explained “needle incident.” OQA’s remaining members—flighty but lovable Lucy Jones; dependable Diane Williams and her roommate, Alice Flagstaff; and innovative Candace Braithwaite—need more support. Enter Byron Grant, a gay sewing store manager who deals in rumor and gossip as much as in thread and batting, and his best friend, shy, artistic Rob, both younger than the youngest OQA member by about 30 years. Don’t worry, there’s nothing in the bylaws expressly prohibiting men. And so this quirky group of artisans attempts to dethrone the always-winning, clearly evil Logan Quilters Society (“We don’t hate anyone!...We just don’t prefer to associate with cheaters”), all the while wrestling with interpersonal conflict, trauma, and, let’s face it, a few tacky ideas. The plot is silly and largely predictable, but McCann’s prose is bursting at the seams with humor and genuinely tender, touching moments. You’ll root for these misfits from Page 1.
Simply charming.Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2026
ISBN: 9798890920461
Page Count: 260
Publisher: Torrey House Press
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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