A well-turned study of loss and trauma.
The author of The End of Eddy (2017) contemplates his brother’s decline and death.
This mournful novel, along with the simultaneously released (and sunnier) Monique Escapes, marks the end of French novelist Louis’ autofictional saga about his harrowing past. Here, the end comes at the beginning, as the narrator explores his lack of emotion upon hearing the news of his (unnamed) brother’s death at 38. In some regards, it’s because his death wasn’t unexpected: The brother escaped their abusive upbringing by retreating into drugs and alcohol, slowly drinking himself to death. But the brother’s trajectory wasn’t straightforward, and the narrator doesn’t want to excuse his own coldness. So he talks with his brother’s girlfriends, uncovering stories of shocking abuse on his part, as well as outsize kindness; and he recalls moments when his brother treated him with the same generosity. “I’ll never let Father crush you the way he’s crushed me,” the narrator recalls his brother saying. (Louis’ language, deftly translated by acclaimed novelist Aw, is full of distancing maneuvers: In addition to not naming his brother, the narrator also consistently refers to their father as “his father,” rhetorically disowning him.) As the narrator thrived—in part by writing bestsellers about family trauma—his brother worsened, which understandably stokes a degree of guilt, especially when it’s time to discuss paying for his funeral: “I was the traitor, the one who had made money writing books about his family, and it was time to repay my debt…” But the narrator is unwilling to keep his emotions at arm’s length, drawing solace from more intellectual writing about grief by Anne Carson and Joan Didion, and elucidating “facts” that he’s careful not to let slip from the narrative. If this is indeed the end of the saga, as he says, much remains unprocessed, an uncertainty that gives this book a troubling, uncanny tension.
A well-turned study of loss and trauma.Pub Date: June 2, 2026
ISBN: 9780374616830
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
An existential crisis that steps on its own final moments.
With only a month left until the world ends due to a swiftly approaching black hole, Don and Rodney, a retired gay couple, road-trip from Maine to Washington to spend their final days with their son.
After reports that a planet-swallowing black hole is making its way toward Earth, Rodney and Don—who have been together for 40 years and survived everything from homophobia to the HIV crisis—decide to pack their belongings into an RV, say goodbye to their neighbors, and travel from Camden, Maine, to Washington to uphold a promise to spend their final days with their son. They can’t wait any longer, since there’s already chaos around the country: “Military vehicles in the streets of most cities and towns. Looting, rioting, the burning of cars and buildings and people, all of it had already happened.” As they make their way west across the country, they encounter fellow travelers ranging from close-knit families to free-spirited hippies, some of whom have come to terms with the impending end of the world and others who haven’t. While the story seems to be asking readers what they would do if they had 30 days left to live, and reflects on what different kinds of acceptance might look like in the face of unavoidable tragedy, it loses some of its poignancy in a series of thinly padded monologues about the meaning of life. Clearly intended to pack an emotional punch, it’s failed by an abrupt ending, and the way the journey’s mystery—which will be obvious to many readers—is revealed by an info dump in the last chapter.
An existential crisis that steps on its own final moments.Pub Date: April 28, 2026
ISBN: 9781250881236
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
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