The best thing that’s happened in the crowded world of Lewinskiana in a long time.
A woman revisits a troubling chapter in her past with the help of Saint Monica Lewinsky.
“Monica Lewinsky was born in 1973 to a noble family of Jews living in the American Empire. She grew up a beautiful and spirited girl and was given a rare position as a servant to the emperor in the heart of the imperial palace.” Langbein’s second novel opens with a brief biography of Monica Lewinsky written in the style of Lives of the Saints; similar lives of real female saints are interspersed throughout this complex comic confection. Saint Monica is invoked as a prelude to the story of Jean Dornan, a 45-year-old translator working in New York City’s court system. Jean has begun to be overwhelmed by memories of an affair she had with a professor in the summer of 1998, the same year as Monica’s fateful tryst. Before she knows it, the desperate woman is in the presence of a beatific Saint Monica, who guides her through a detailed re-examination of the six weeks she spent in France at an intensive study program on medieval art at age 19, told through flashbacks. She and Monica occasionally comment on the unfolding action. For example, when Jean, an accomplished cook, has the opportunity to make dinner for the other students and professors, she chooses lasagna. In her hands, this pedestrian dish is “a hot sarcophagus of deliciousness” that completely blows everyone away. “You’re a fucking genius,” Monica declares. Jean’s culinary skills get the attention of the handsome young scholar who’s leading the program, and things unfold in the way they often did in that era. In retrospect, Jean can see what an ambitious and gifted young woman she was, finally understanding that the way the scholar eventually punished her for what happened between them warped the course of her life. The final section of the book delivers a satisfyingly mythic resolution, continuing to interweave art historical and religious tropes into the story on multiple levels. Like Jean’s lasagna, the novel succeeds beyond expectations, its bold, clever comedic lineaments supporting a serious and poignant examination of female desire and male power.
The best thing that’s happened in the crowded world of Lewinskiana in a long time.Pub Date: April 14, 2026
ISBN: 9780385551502
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
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 debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.
A high school senior pursues an affair with her teacher.
Seventeen-year-old Waldo, the narrator of McCurdy’s fiction debut, lives in Anchorage, Alaska, with her mother, though she’s long been the parent in their relationship. She heats her own frozen meals and pays the bills on time while her mom chases man after man and makes well-meaning promises she never keeps. Waldo blows her Victoria’s Secret wages on online shopping sprees and binges on junk food, inevitably crashing after the fleeting highs of her indulgences. Mr. Korgy, her creative writing teacher, has “thinning hair and nose pores”; he’s 40 years old and married with a child. Nevertheless—or possibly as a result?—Waldo’s attraction to him is “instant. So sudden it’s alarming. So palpable it’s confusing.” Mr. Korgy professes to want to keep their friendship aboveboard, but after a sexual encounter at the school’s winter formal that she initiates, an affair begins. Will this reckless pursuit be the one that actually satisfies Waldo, and is she as mature as she thinks she is? Waldo is a keen observer of people and provides sharp commentary on the punishing work of female beauty. Readers of McCurdy’s bestselling memoir, I’m Glad My Mom Died (2022), will surely be curious about the tumultuous mother-daughter relationship, and it is one of the novel’s highlights, full of realistic pity and anger and need. (“I want to scream at her. I want her to hug me.”) Unfortunately, the prose is often unwieldy and sometimes downright cringeworthy: When Waldo tells Mr. Korgy she loves him, “The words hang in the air in that constipated way they do when you know that you shouldn’t have said them.” Waldo frequently lists emotions and adjectives in triplicate, and events that could be significant aren’t sufficiently explored or given enough space to breathe before the novel races on to the next thing.
A debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2026
ISBN: 9780593723739
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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