A very satisfying novel with two intriguing leads who strive to live ethically.
A tragic hit-and-run death brings together a woman with a failed marriage and a cop with troubles of his own.
Charlotte Oakes is walking in her Chicago neighborhood when a little girl runs into the street and is struck and killed by a car that looks awfully like her own, a car that doesn’t stop. Did her daughter, Libby, borrow her car? Libby, who struggles with OCD and addiction issues, has always been a cross to bear. And Charlotte and her husband, Daniel, are in a marriage that died long ago. Another witness is Ed Kelly, a Chicago cop. He was recently wounded—and his partner killed—in a showdown with a drug dealer. And now it looks as though it was a bullet from his own gun that killed Tommy, so Ed is on paid leave, which he uses to stake out the intersection and try to find the mystery car. On separate missions—Charlotte, bereft over the little girl and hoping that the car was not hers, and Ed, determined to break this case—both visit the site almost daily and eventually become friends. Meanwhile, Charlotte has had an affair and is pregnant. And Ed’s daughter and her husband are so desperate for a child that she persuades her mother to be a surrogate. So, we have two good people facing a ton of challenges. Charlotte finally tells Daniel, who, surprisingly, offers to accept the child and save the marriage, but will Charlotte stay? This story is about a search for the rogue driver and Charlotte and Ed, who slowly work through a lot of issues, trying to accommodate what life—and new life—has thrown at them. Uhlmann is an experienced writer whose characters ring true: the resourceful Charlotte who slowly finds the courage to rethink her life and Ed, a good guy who is not all that sensitive or intuitive, but kind beyond measure. The title is apt in many ways: We are talking about more than cross streets.
A very satisfying novel with two intriguing leads who strive to live ethically.Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9781647428891
Page Count: 296
Publisher: She Writes Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 28, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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 welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.
A falsely accused Black man goes into hiding in this masterful novella by Wright (1908-1960), finally published in full.
Written in 1941 and '42, between Wright’s classics Native Son and Black Boy, this short novel concerns Fred Daniels, a modest laborer who’s arrested by police officers and bullied into signing a false confession that he killed the residents of a house near where he was working. In a brief unsupervised moment, he escapes through a manhole and goes into hiding in a sewer. A series of allegorical, surrealistic set pieces ensues as Fred explores the nether reaches of a church, a real estate firm, and a jewelry store. Each stop is an opportunity for Wright to explore themes of hope, greed, and exploitation; the real estate firm, Wright notes, “collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent from poor colored folks.” But Fred’s deepening existential crisis and growing distance from society keep the scenes from feeling like potted commentaries. As he wallpapers his underground warren with cash, mocking and invalidating the currency, he registers a surrealistic but engrossing protest against divisive social norms. The novel, rejected by Wright’s publisher, has only appeared as a substantially truncated short story until now, without the opening setup and with a different ending. Wright's take on racial injustice seems to have unsettled his publisher: A note reveals that an editor found reading about Fred’s treatment by the police “unbearable.” That may explain why Wright, in an essay included here, says its focus on race is “rather muted,” emphasizing broader existential themes. Regardless, as an afterword by Wright’s grandson Malcolm attests, the story now serves as an allegory both of Wright (he moved to France, an “exile beyond the reach of Jim Crow and American bigotry”) and American life. Today, it resonates deeply as a story about race and the struggle to envision a different, better world.
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-59853-676-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Library of America
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK TO SCREEN
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