A delight from start to finish.
Two successful career-minded women kick off a tender romance at an animal rescue fundraiser, but they must contend with lingering grief and heartbreak to reach their happily-ever-after.
Thirty-eight-year-old Rose Josten is an affluent consultant at Integral Business Solutions with a deep love for her rescue pugs and the finer things in life. While attending a fundraiser for the Humane Society, she meets a mysterious woman who, on first impression, seems very much her opposite. Ash Stewart, who's 40, feels more at home in ripped jeans and band T-shirts than designer clothes, but from the first time she meets Rose, their banter is flirtatious and easy even though Ash is still carrying the emotional remnants of a divorce and limping from a particularly horrific car accident. A talented filmmaker, she's hoping to finally see an important and personal project come to fruition. When Ash approaches bombastic billionaire Irene Brentworth to contribute funding, she knows it's a long shot. Surprising no one more than Ash herself, Irene is interested and asks to see a more fleshed-out proposal. Hoping to help Ash get ready for the big pitch, her friend and employee Emma reaches out to the highly sought-after Integral for a consultation. When Rose agrees to take the job, she has no idea she'll soon be reunited with the mysterious woman she chatted with at the fundraiser. Most of the conflict is internal, with Rose concerned about hitting her midlife crisis and Ash trying to rebuild her professional career. It's lovely to see a romance between two women older than their 20s. Rose and Ash are settled in their careers and their passions and are confident about who they are and how they want to be perceived by those around them. Stetz-Waters balances humor with a touch of charming satire; the words sweet and earnest are just the start to describing this slow-burn romance.
A delight from start to finish.Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-538-70925-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Forever
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2022
PERSPECTIVES
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.
A frustrated advice columnist takes matters into her own hands.
Before dropping out of MIT during the second semester of her sophomore year, Debbie Mullen had designs on becoming the next Bill Gates. Now, almost 30 years later, the stay-at-home wife and mother of two uses her considerable genius to keep the Mullens’ Hingham, Massachusetts, household functioning “like a well-oiled machine.” In her spare time, Debbie also gardens and shares “the fruits of [her] wisdom” with neighbors via the weekly advice column she writes for Hingham Household, a local “family-oriented” newspaper. Though Debbie is proud of her husband and teen daughters’ accomplishments, her own life sometimes feels a bit empty. As such, she’s both honored and excited when Home Gardening magazine selects her backyard to feature in their next issue. Then, at the last minute, the publication decides to go in a different direction and instead spotlights the roses of her arch rival. Later that day, the editor-in-chief of Hingham Household axes her column because she’d counseled a reader to get a divorce. That evening, Debbie learns that her hard-working husband’s miserly boss refused his promotion request, her brilliant older daughter’s sketchy boyfriend broke her heart, and her athletically gifted younger daughter’s chauvinistic coach cut her from the soccer team for being “chubby.” Enough is enough. Debbie has always given great advice—everybody says so. If certain individuals don’t know what’s best for themselves, maybe it’s her obligation to help them see the light. Increasingly unhinged entries from a “Dear Debbie” drafts folder pepper the briskly paced, meticulously crafted tale, which unfolds courtesy of a pinwheeling first-person narrative. Some of the plot’s myriad twists are more impressive than others, but plucky, puckish Debbie is a nontraditional antihero for the ages.
Gleefully sadistic, gloriously gratifying revenge fiction.Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
ISBN: 9781464249624
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Poisoned Pen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
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
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