A sensitive story that’s admirably free of sentimentality.
In Elzinga’s novel, an ailing construction surveyor takes a job rife with complications and wrestles with loneliness and his looming mortality.
Forty-something Tom Bishop loves his job working as a surveyor for Midwest Stable Platforms, a company that builds the foundations for wind turbines, “those tall spindly brigades of white acrobats you’ve seen cartwheeling across the landscape of rural America.” Divorced for nearly 20 years—his marriage to Paige only lasted three—he finds solace in his “nomadic lifestyle,” traveling wherever the home office sends him, a lonesomeness that Elzinga renders unsentimentally but poignantly. His current job is in Pigeon Falls, a small, friendly village in Wisconsin that affords its visitors “absolute quiet” during its sleepy evenings. However, the client, Burnell Sandberg, is not peaceful; in fact, he’s a “a sad man with an appetite for creating conflict when none is necessary.” He wants the foundations for two turbines to be built before the freeze arrives—a very challenging task for Tom that isn’t made any easier by Burnell’s truculence. However, the compensation is excellent, and the hard work distracts Tom from anxieties about the pending results of some medical tests. He suffers from terrible abdominal pain and suspects they’re caused by something life-threatening—a terrifying prospect for a man without a family to offer him comfort. Meanwhile, a young restaurant server, Candace Cane, who reminds Tom of Paige, is being physically abused by her husband; one of Tom’s crewmates, Eddie, a hardworking teenager, begins a friendship with her that promises to bloom into more—a frightening and complex predicament, delicately conveyed by the author. There’s a moving strain of melancholy that runs through the entire book, especially in the tension between hope and resignation. The thoughtful Candace, who’s taking philosophy classes, tries to balance the two in her own understanding of Friedrich Nietzsche’s amor fati—one must learn to love one’s destiny, whatever it is. Overall, this is a deeply engrossing, if heartbreaking, tale that impressively refuses to succumb to melodrama.
A sensitive story that’s admirably free of sentimentality.Pub Date: April 8, 2025
ISBN: 9781952526213
Page Count: 278
Publisher: Waters Edge Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 24, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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