Full of intelligence, social consciousness, and cultural engagement.
A crew of five women friends, long-distance since college, weather the travails of their 40th year.
Each chapter of Nemens’ sophomore novel opens with a line or two from the group chat shared by Carson the writer, Gregg the politician, Hillary the doctor, Bella the litigator, and Reba the former consultant, or with one of their individual texts to or from someone else. This infrastructure helps move the timeline and the plot; in addition, a thumbnail guide to the characters appears at the beginning of the book. With five central characters, many supporting ones, and a trajectory covering two decades, almost year by year, these elements are helpful. “Another quiet stretch for the women was 2014. In the eighteen months prior they had all turned thirty (Reba, with her basketball gap year, was the first across the threshold; Gregg brought up the rear).” As the omniscient narrator goes on to fill in details from each friend, as well as current events, cultural moments, and updates on Britney Spears, it’s tempting to picture giant timelines papering the walls of the author’s study. Her management of the five-pronged, often high-drama plot, the rotating points of view, and the characters’ constant introspection is impressive. Yet somehow the sheer complexity of it all keeps the book from developing enough momentum to ever become fully immersive, and none of the five main characters evokes the kind of identification that invites the reader to connect emotionally. A typical moment has Carson meditating on the ways she and each of her friends has fallen short of their dreams. Gregg, for example, “was blind to the gotcha of promoting progressivism while being inextricably bound up with the latest (last?) stage of late-stage capitalism; she couldn’t see, or wouldn’t acknowledge, her normie marriage, the patriarchy of her prenup, how her big-shouldered and bruising careerist tendencies, cloaked as they were in pastel blazers, were only nominally better than Zeke’s cutthroat business acumen.” In fact, that cutthroat acumen of Gregg’s husband Zeke will play a major role in the book’s gut-punch climax, rewarding the reader who’s paying attention to all the details.
Full of intelligence, social consciousness, and cultural engagement.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781963108668
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Tin House
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2025
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
SEEN & HEARD
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.
A love story about a life of second chances.
In Nassau, in the Bahamas, casino detective Vincent LaPorta grills Alfie Logan, who’d come up a winner three times in a row at the roulette table and walked away with $2 million. “How did you do it?” asks the detective. Alfie calmly denies cheating. You wired all the money to a Gianna Rule, LaPorta says. Why? To explain, Alfie produces a composition book with the words “For the Boss, to Be Read Upon My Death” written on the cover. Read this for answers, Alfie suggests, calling it a love story. His mother had passed along to him a strange trait: He can say “Twice!” and go back to a specific time and place to have a do-over. But it only works once for any particular moment, and then he must live with the new consequences. He can only do this for himself and can’t prevent anyone from dying. Alfie regularly uses his power—failing to impress a girl the first time, he finds out more about her, goes back in time, and presto! She likes him. The premise is of course not credible—LaPorta doesn’t buy it either—but it’s intriguing. Most people would probably love to go back and unsay something. The story’s focus is on Alfie’s love for Gianna and whether it’s requited, unrequited, or both. In any case, he’s obsessed with her. He’s a good man, though, an intelligent person with ordinary human failings and a solid moral compass. Albom writes in a warm, easy style that transports the reader to a world of second chances and what-ifs, where spirituality lies close to the surface but never intrudes on the story. Though a cynic will call it sappy, anyone who is sick to their core from the daily news will enjoy this escape from reality.
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780062406682
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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