Mesmerizing and important.
Historical fiction suffused with contemporary themes.
Antonio Sonoro is the descendent of a long line of legendarily bad men in Dorado, Mexico. He, too, is a bad man, and he will become a figure of legend once he survives a shootout with the Texas Rangers that destroys his face and leaves his brother dead. As El Tragabalas—“The Bullet Swallower”—he inspires both fear and admiration. His grandson will make a different kind of name for himself as a singing cowboy. Jaime’s life as a movie star is as pleasant as Antonio’s was hard, but his tranquil existence is disturbed by two unexpected arrivals: a book detailing the evil exploits of the Sonoro men through history and a stranger who calls himself Remedio. Chapters that alternate between 1895 and 1964 show Antonio battling between his need for revenge and his desire for repentance, and Jaime struggling to understand what his family’s past means for himself, his father, and his children. James makes such deft use of tropes from Westerns, Gothic literature, and magical realism that they don’t feel like tropes at all. She clearly understands why these motifs persist, and she gives them life with prose that’s both spare and intensely rich. This novel is valuable for its gorgeous language and gripping story alone, but the questions it asks could hardly be timelier. Should we be expected to pay for the sins of our ancestors? To whom do we owe reparations? How do we break generational cycles of abuse and trauma? There’s not much overt discussion of race in this novel, but the impact of racism on Antonio’s life is impossible to miss, as is his family’s complicity in exploiting both the land and its Indigenous inhabitants.
Mesmerizing and important.Pub Date: Jan. 23, 2024
ISBN: 9781668009321
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
An engaging, imaginative narrative hampered by its lack of subtlety.
The Medusa myth, reimagined as an Afrocentric, feminist tale with the Gorgon recast as avenging hero.
In mythological Greece, where gods still have a hand in the lives of humans, 17-year-old Medusa lives on an island with her parents, old sea gods who were overthrown at the rise of the Olympians, and her sisters, Euryale and Stheno. The elder sisters dote on Medusa and bond over the care of her “locs...my dearest physical possession.” Their idyll is broken when Euryale is engaged to be married to a cruel demi-god. Medusa intervenes, and a chain of events leads her to a meeting with the goddess Athena, who sees in her intelligence, curiosity, and a useful bit of rage. Athena chooses Medusa for training in Athens to become a priestess at the Parthenon. She joins the other acolytes, a group of teenage girls who bond, bicker, and compete in various challenges for their place at the temple. As an outsider, Medusa is bullied (even in ancient Athens white girls rudely grab a Black girl’s hair) and finds a best friend in Apollonia. She also meets a nameless boy who always seems to be there whenever she is in need; this turns out to be Poseidon, who is grooming the inexplicably naïve Medusa. When he rapes her, Athena finds out and punishes Medusa and her sisters by transforming their locs into snakes. The sisters become Gorgons, and when colonizing men try to claim their island, the killing begins. Telling a story of Black female power through the lens of ancient myth is conceptually appealing, but this novel published as adult fiction reads as though intended for a younger audience.
An engaging, imaginative narrative hampered by its lack of subtlety.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9780593733769
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
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
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