A fabulist fever dream that is perhaps a bit too opaque.
Professor Q’s “bland, uneventful life” gets shaken up as he’s consumed by his love affair with a doll.
Nevers, a coastal city on Valeria Island, is constantly changing to suit the wants and needs of its colonizers, but underneath the city is a “shadow zone” where the college students are organizing a revolution. Professor Q, a 50-year-old instructor at Lone Boat University, receives a package in the mail with a doll inside. He becomes enamored with the doll, Aliss, in a way he hasn’t felt before. At the encouragement of his mysterious friend Owlish, who tells him, “This could be your last chance for adventure,” he begins an extramarital affair with Aliss. He creates a “love nest” in a church on a nearby abandoned island so his wife, Maria, won’t find out. At first, Aliss is a normal doll, but one day Professor Q leaves a window open and a strange wind blows in, transforming her into an animate being. Professor Q, who was obsessed with her even when she was simply a doll, is delighted by her development of sentience. His relationship with Aliss remains a consistent distraction from the social unrest brewing in Nevers. He barely realizes that his students have gone on strike even though his classes are practically empty. As the book progresses, it becomes unclear how much of what Professor Q experiences is real and how much is imagined. The line between dream and reality becomes increasingly blurred as Professor Q’s sanity comes into question, making things difficult to follow. Chapters 29 and 31 change from a third-person perspective to a second-person narrative addressed to “you” and attempt to unveil some of the obscurities in the story. In the book’s best moments, it’s a wonderfully imaginative fable that resonates with political critique and protest. However, in some areas the book’s vision gets murky, like a dream, which is interesting conceptually but doesn’t quite work here.
A fabulist fever dream that is perhaps a bit too opaque.Pub Date: June 6, 2023
ISBN: 9781644452356
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Graywolf
Review Posted Online: March 27, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2023
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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