A piercingly eerie, if sometimes-blurry, account of a prison sentence.
Debut author Silversmith presents a novel about a jailed man’s memories.
The unnamed narrator of this odd tale is in a prison camp. He doesn’t have much to read to pass the time aside from some selected chapters of Robinson Crusoe, a self-help guide for dentists, and a few other miscellaneous texts. There also isn’t much else for him to do, although he’s occasionally allowed to walk outside when he isn’t being forced to endure painful torture. He’s also compelled to do strange tasks on occasion; for instance, he’s made to play the tuba, even though he has no talent for the instrument, and make umbrellas, despite a lack of skill in that area, as well. Through all of this, he makes a concerted effort to write down his memories; he had done so before in a journal that was taken from him some time ago. He was once an attorney with a family who lived in a nice home, and how he came into his current state, subsisting on bad soup and gray bread, is a winding, occasionally vague story, although a revolution of some kind was involved. Will he ever be able to escape? As the story unravels, readers receive bits and pieces of information about the protagonist’s life and the awful world he inhabits, and many of its small details are compelling. Some will squirm as the tale proceeds from the seeming innocuousness of the narrator’s arrest to tortures with lighthearted names, such as “Water Fun” and “the Doll House Vacation.” Certain points are less clear, as when the narrator says, “Let us forget this book if this book ever was a book, if this book ever existed” or “Remember, remember. But don’t remember too much. Remember just enough.” Such singsong assertions are less insightful than they are puzzling. Still, the bleak environment of the story allows for consistent surprises; there’s no telling what memories the protagonist will conjure next or where they will take him.
A piercingly eerie, if sometimes-blurry, account of a prison sentence.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-940724-31-7
Page Count: 214
Publisher: Gival Press
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The story unfolds so irresistibly that newcomers may think Grisham’s been writing thrillers like this his whole life.
What hasn’t legendary legal eagle Grisham tried yet? How about a thriller about serial kidnapping and international terrorism.
When Paul and Chelsea Tanner disappear during a day trip on their Paris honeymoon, their abductors demand a ransom of $2 million from Chelsea’s wealthy parents, and a few days later the same sum from Paul’s much less well-heeled parents. After orthopedist Lowell Clayburn, Chelsea’s father, ponies up the ransom without breathing a word to the authorities, his daughter is promptly released. But even though Paul’s parents sell their home, liquidate their assets, and borrow money from the Clayburns to meet the kidnappers’ demands, the villains hold on to Paul anyway. Asked whether he’s ever seen such an outcome in a double kidnapping, FBI deputy director Andrew Strong tells Lowell: “No, this is a new one.” But it’s not, as Strong knows all too well; it’s the third such active case, all involving honeymooning couples whose bridegrooms had served in the armed forces. After masterfully drawing readers in with his bare-knuckle account of the Tanners’ abduction and the attempt by their families and the CIA to tell the lies required to keep caring friends and the rapacious press at bay, Grisham effortlessly switches gears to follow CIA agent Rae Claire Russo and Stuart Nash, a former Department of Justice prosecutor at Guantanamo Bay who agrees to marry her so they can serve as bait for the kidnappers, whose motives include justice and revenge as well as cold hard cash. So much for the imprisoned Paul’s wistful reflection that “hopefully, it was only about money.”
The story unfolds so irresistibly that newcomers may think Grisham’s been writing thrillers like this his whole life.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2026
ISBN: 9780385550543
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2026
Brilliant, affecting work from one of contemporary literature’s masters.
A phone call from her past disrupts the tenuously reconstructed life of a concert pianist turned farmer’s wife.
We know from the beginning that Livia Cable is the battered survivor of her brother Cyrus’ death by suicide, a devastating romance, and a career-ending injury. Only 11 when Cyrus stepped in front of a train, she was already marked out as different in her rural Tennessee hometown by her extraordinary musical ability. The siblings had huddled together against their angry mother’s frequent beatings, and Livia still feels abandoned by Cyrus years later, when she picks up the phone to hear the voice of Sigurd, the fiery labor organizer she loved and lost to “the revolution” while on scholarship at the Indiana University School of Music. Now married to kind, steady childhood friend Charlie, Livia looks back on her affair with Sigurd as she struggles to deal with the recent death of her mother, a compulsive hoarder who left a house stuffed with junk to be disposed of and bitter memories that haven’t faded over time. Kingsolver skillfully juggles the two time frames to unravel Livia’s complicated feelings about the life she lost when her right hand was crushed and the life she has now as a country piano teacher. A partita, she explains to Sigurd early on, “is a composition made of a lot of parts with a lot of different moods…the artist’s work is to make them all add up to something that feels whole.” That’s precisely what Kingsolver does in this beautifully paced and judged narrative, which builds to revelations uncovered amid the piles of trash in Livia’s childhood home about the reasons for Cyrus’ suicide (clearly foreshadowed) and their mother’s rage (startling and heartbreaking). A fierce belief that great art is for everyone joins Kingsolver’s familiar preoccupations with class distinctions, social injustice, and the complex bonds of family and community in a tender denouement.
Brilliant, affecting work from one of contemporary literature’s masters.Pub Date: Oct. 6, 2026
ISBN: 9780063577541
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2026
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