A tense page-turner that shows adolescent humanity at its best and worst.
Marooned on a desert island, six high school girls must survive the elements and one another in this debut novel by Castle.
In 1993, 17-year-old Ellery Holmes is a talented heptathlete, starting as a scholarship student at Kings’ Academy, a top English private school. She’ll be meeting some of her new classmates (five girls, two boys) for the first time on a school trip to the Maldives. Ellery is something of a loner—a trait that’s exacerbated by the recent death of her father. She makes a new friend in the brainy, bullied Dawkes, but the rest of the rich, spoiled group offer little hope of acceptance. Petty jealousies and spite, Ellery can handle, but then the group’s plane goes down and they wash up on an uninhabited island. The pilot is dead, the group’s teacher is badly injured, and the two boys swim off alone to a neighboring island. Ellery and Dawkes are left trying to cooperate with alpha mean girl Whitney and her fellow “Cronies.” Further complicating matters is the fact that the remaining member of the group, Skye, is Ellery’s former best friend, whom she hasn’t spoken to since they kissed two years ago. Castle writes from Ellery’s first-person point of view and intersperses occasional diary entries by Dawkes throughout the narrative. The prose is crisp and effective, and the dialogue feels naturalistic. Castle’s story explores what humans are capable of when far from civilization, unambiguously following in the footsteps of William Golding’s classic novel Lord of the Flies1954), which it name checks. The main difference is that Castle’s castaways are mostly female. The stage is thus set for an exploration of the teenage group’s strengths (levelheadedness, adaptable intelligence, a willingness to cooperate) and weaknesses (posturing and a toxic adherence to social hierarchies). One can argue that the negative characteristics are attached too tightly to the Cronies, which makes them rather grueling characters; it also lessens the impact of their descent into evil. Nonetheless, the other players’ plights demand resolution and will keep readers on tenterhooks.
A tense page-turner that shows adolescent humanity at its best and worst.Pub Date: Dec. 19, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-916903-13-5
Page Count: 374
Publisher: Dark Horse Publishing LLP
Review Posted Online: Feb. 20, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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