Weaves historical fiction, Japanese literary icons, and meditations on love into a novel that’s remarkable on many levels.
A woman in contemporary Tokyo dreams of other lives—as a courtesan in Edo, then a lady’s maid in the ninth century—all to help her confront the stages of love in her own marriage.
An intertextual story of longing, fidelity, and the role of women in Japanese culture, the novel begins with 2-year-old Riko falling in love with Naruya. Though they eventually marry, it is an unhappy arrangement—she worships Naruya, but he is an unrepentant womanizer. With the help of former monk Mr. Takaoka (who shares the name of a ninth-century Buddhist prince), she learns a kind of magic: to enter nightly into a single, continuous dream, one that lasts for years and that she remembers when she’s awake. These dreamworlds span years of her waking life. First she is Shungetsu, from the Edo period, a child sold to work in the Yoshiwara pleasure district, where she learns to become a courtesan. Mr. Takaoka enters her dreamworld in the form of samurai Takada, and the two fall in love. When this story comes to its tragic conclusion, an even earlier narrative springs up: She is a lady-in-waiting during the Heian period. Her princess is married to Narihira, who, like Naruya, conducts countless affairs. The prose, conversational and effervescent, belies the depth of the novel’s complexity; both dream narratives take their frameworks from other texts: The Tales of Ise, partially written by the ninth-century poet Narihira, who is the hero of Riko’s dream, and the 1987 fantasy novel Takaoka’s Travels by Tatsuhiko Shibusawa. Riko can dream these stories because she’s read the sources, but her own life is also a reflection of these framing texts, and so we get them in triplicate, variations on a tale of female submission, negotiation, and freedom.
Weaves historical fiction, Japanese literary icons, and meditations on love into a novel that’s remarkable on many levels.Pub Date: Oct. 21, 2025
ISBN: 9781593768058
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Soft Skull Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.
A French art historian’s English-language fiction debut combines the story of a loving relationship between a grandfather and granddaughter with an enlightening discussion of art.
One day, when 10-year-old Mona removes the necklace given to her by her now-dead grandmother, she experiences a frightening, hour-long bout of blindness. Her parents take her to the doctor, who gives her a variety of tests and also advises that she see a psychiatrist. Her grandfather Henry tells her parents that he will take care of that assignment, but instead, he takes Mona on weekly visits to either the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay, or the Centre Pompidou, where each week they study a single work of art, gazing at it deeply and then discussing its impact and history and the biography of its maker. For the reader’s benefit, Schlesser also describes each of the works in scrupulous detail. As the year goes on, Mona faces the usual challenges of elementary school life and the experiences of being an only child, and slowly begins to understand the causes of her temporary blindness. Primarily an amble through a few dozen of Schlesser’s favorite works of art—some well known and others less so, from Botticelli and da Vinci through Basquiat and Bourgeois—the novel would probably benefit from being read at a leisurely pace. While the dialogue between Henry and the preternaturally patient and precocious Mona sometimes strains credulity, readers who don’t have easy access to the museums of Paris may enjoy this vicarious trip in the company of a guide who focuses equally on that which can be seen and the context that can’t be. Come for the novel, stay for the introductory art history course.
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2025
ISBN: 9798889661115
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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
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