A deeply felt, refreshingly honest story of two friends finding their ways down different paths.
Widely translated Mexican author Nettel considers the thorniness of motherhood in this novel shortlisted for the International Booker Prize.
Is motherhood worth it? For Laura, the answer’s always been a resounding no: “For years I tried to convince my girlfriends that procreating was a hopeless mistake.” Children “would always represent a limit on their freedom.” Since their 20s, her friend Alina has agreed. Independent, busy traveling, the two look askance at the societal expectations women face. Later, settled in Mexico City, Laura has her tubes tied. Then, shockingly, Alina announces she’s trying to get pregnant. What happens next is every prospective parent’s worst nightmare: Alina learns there’s a grave problem with her baby, who won’t live past birth. Running parallel to Alina’s story is that of Doris, Laura’s widowed neighbor, whose young son throws daily violent tantrums. As Laura tries to support Alina through an impossibly difficult situation, she’s drawn to her struggling neighbor’s troubled son as well as to a local feminist collective, finding herself reconsidering ideas of motherhood, family, even “frequently illogical, incomprehensible” love itself. A pair of pigeons nest on her balcony and raise an ungainly chick that looks nothing like them; Laura becomes convinced another bird laid the egg, practicing brood parasitism. Nettel describes the realities of her characters’ lives with a compassionate but unsparing eye. Every mother depicted is fully human, not selfless and saintly but a complex individual with mixed, even contradictory feelings. There’s joy here and camaraderie, but there are no easy solutions. “I don’t understand…” Alina tells Laura at one point. “And in her voice, [Laura] thought [she] could hear, not indignation, or even bewilderment, but simply all the despair in the world.”
A deeply felt, refreshingly honest story of two friends finding their ways down different paths.Pub Date: Aug. 8, 2023
ISBN: 9781639730032
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2023
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
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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