A lush, immersive historical novel about the American Southwest that almost soars.
The first novel from the author of the acclaimed story collection Sabrina and Corina (2019).
Fajardo-Anstine, whose debut story collection was a finalist for many prizes, including the National Book Award, returns with a sprawling novel that follows five generations of a family of Mexican and Indigenous descent who live throughout the region now known as New Mexico and Colorado. At the heart is Luz, a teenager who reads tea leaves and discovers she has clairvoyant gifts. Abandoned by her parents, she and her older brother, Diego, make their way to Denver, where they live with their aunt Maria Josie and toil at jobs that barely cover the necessities. This is Depression-era Denver—which Fajardo-Anstine brings to life in sensory-rich details—and poverty, racism, and lack of opportunity rule. When Diego is badly beaten for romancing a White woman, Maria Josie sends him away, and 17-year-old Luz finds a more lucrative job working for a family friend, a young Greek American lawyer named David. With a nod to the Black Lives Matter movement, David’s big case involves holding the city responsible for the brutal murder of a Mexican man by a cop. While the novel shines light on many deplorable events and attitudes from the U.S. past—land grabs, Klan marches, racism and segregation, brutal violence, sexism, and sexual double standards—it fails to fully illuminate Luz. She’s a conduit to the past rather than a fully developed character with her own rich inner life. “True love isn’t real, not for girls like us at least,” her best friend reflects as Luz struggles with her desire for David, a womanizer, even though she’s engaged to another man who loves her. “You know who the world treats worse than girls like us? Girls who are alone.” The novel’s rush to a happy ending means we don’t get to see Luz wrestle with this impossible choice.
A lush, immersive historical novel about the American Southwest that almost soars.Pub Date: June 7, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-525-51132-8
Page Count: 336
Publisher: One World/Random House
Review Posted Online: March 15, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2022
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
SEEN & HEARD
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
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