A novel that offers a character unafraid to embrace who she is: smart, sassy, driven, cheerful—and plus size.
A Wisconsin-born New York City transplant sets out to find herself after her divorce.
Sunny Greene holds two simultaneous truths in her mind. She’s devastated that her husband, Zack, has left her, and she’s absolutely certain that he was cheating on her. She’s successful by most metrics—she runs a boutique PR company that is doing extremely well; she lives in Chelsea, her dream neighborhood, where she has a six-block walk to work with her two dogs, Sophia and Blanche. But she still feels in pieces over the divorce, despite all the negative commentary that Zack used to pour on her. With her close friends Brooke and Noor—both also recently divorced—she sets out to discover her successful future. But while getting ready for her and her friends’ “divorcation,” Sunny impulsively decides to try on a swimsuit at Bergdorf Goodman, an adventure that goes terribly wrong when she gets stuck in it. After the resulting panic attack has ended (and a little time has passed), she realizes she has to embrace the person she is. All 5-foot-11, 275 pounds, 35 years of herself. She restarts a newsletter she stopped writing because Zack found it embarrassing; she embraces body neutrality (as she describes it: “Yes I have cellulite, okay—moving on”); and she begins going after what she really wants. When it comes to dating, she’s torn between Ted, a financier, and Dennis, a down-to-earth mailman. And she puts in the hours and effort to turn that ill-fated experience in the changing room into a new business. The novel has a straightforward agenda and the author doesn’t shy away from making it clear at every turn: Hard work and a belief in yourself will result in success in every endeavor, despite bumps in the road.
A novel that offers a character unafraid to embrace who she is: smart, sassy, driven, cheerful—and plus size.Pub Date: June 24, 2025
ISBN: 9781250344205
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2025
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
Great crime fiction.
An apparent suicide threatens to destroy an Irish farm town in the final volume of French’s Cal Hooper trilogy.
In the fictional western Ireland townland of Ardnakelty, “there’s a girl going after missing.” Soon young Rachel Holohan is found dead in the river. Shortly before, she had stopped at Lena Dunne’s home, and nothing had seemed amiss. The medical examiner determines she’d swallowed antifreeze, and he presumes she then fell from a bridge into the water. The medical examiner and the town agree she’d died by suicide. But there is far more to the plot: 16-year-old Trey Reddy thinks Tommy Moynihan murdered Rachel. Moynihan doles out favors and punishments to the local townsfolk, who know it’s best not to cross him. Now rumors spread that Moynihan wants land and has a secret plan to forcibly buy up parcels from the locals. A factory will be built, or a great big data center, or who knows what. If Tommy’s son, Eugene, can get elected to the local council, then compulsory purchase orders for land will follow, and the farms will disappear. Eugene, who’d been romantically involved with Rachel, is wonderfully described as “on the weedy edge of good-looking” and just fine as long as you “don’t have high expectations in the way of chins.” Lena is engaged to the American Cal Hooper, an ex-cop turned woodworker. They are “more or less raising” Trey, and these three core characters are drawn into the mystery of Rachel’s death and may have to face the looming clouds of civilizational change for Ardnakelty. Lena is chastised for “asking your wee questions all round the townland,” and Trey wants to quit school, against Cal’s advice. Finally, the story’s best line: “You can’t go killing people just because they deserve it.”
Great crime fiction.Pub Date: March 31, 2026
ISBN: 9780593493465
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Dec. 26, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2026
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