An earnest but eccentric and aesthetically anarchic take on Christianity’s familiar mythos.
The high-concept Canadian documentarians behind I Live Here (2008) deploy their unique multimedia style in a whimsical biblical allegory.
Advertising is a weird science in its most mundane form, let alone the weird alchemy practiced by Paul Shoebridge and Michael Simons over the past two decade as The Goggles, multimedia wunderkinds most memorable for the award-winning interactive documentary Welcome to Pine Point and the book I Live Here (2008), which documented life for refugees during wartime. Here they’re aided by filmmaker Bate and digital artist James Kerr (better known as Scorpion Dagger) for a literary amalgamation that is one part John Hughes, a dash of Douglas Coupland, and augmented with a series of .gif animations (which can be viewed through an app) that are fancifully Python-esque. The infrastructure is complicated since the book is fashioned around 16-year-old Darryl's messy, overstuffed personal diary, which chronicles his adolescent angst and potential triumph thanks to the arrival of a dodgy messiah. Darryl is a bit of a cipher, uncomfortable with expressing his thoughts and feelings except to his friend Wade, who “died peacefully in his sleep while hanging from a rafter with a rope tied around his neck.” His rare moments of solace lie in his band, “a bitchin’ power duo” propelled by his drummer, Mary, and egged on by their friend Jude. The milieu for this teenage daydream isn’t John Hughes' Shermer, Illinois, but the Naz—that’s Nazareth, as in “Jesus of,” not the Scottish heavy metal band. The book’s precipitating event is the arrival of Jay, son of God and the spark Darryl needs to transform his White Stripes–esque duo into a full-fledged band, Iron Messiah, which unites Darryl and Jay with the power of ROCK. It wouldn’t be a teenage daydream without some angst-y drama, which erupts when Jay takes over Darryl’s band, going so far as to replace him with a doppelgänger, while Jude aims to make some kind of artistic statement by blowing up Darryl’s only other confidant, a tree named Rooty. All of these shenanigans are illustrated with artful but moderately disturbing renditions inspired by medieval paintings and paired with an original heavy metal score.
An earnest but eccentric and aesthetically anarchic take on Christianity’s familiar mythos.Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-3741-1531-9
Page Count: 176
Publisher: MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Jan. 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2021
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
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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