A fine tribute to a tireless and selfless champion of literary genius.
A fictional portrait of Sylvia Beach and her iconic Paris bookshop, Shakespeare and Company, from its founding in 1919 through 1936.
When, after a stint in the Red Cross, adventurous American Sylvia Beach opens Shakespeare and Company, first on 8 rue Dupuytren and later at its famous address, 12 rue de L’Odéon, it soon becomes a haven for Paris’ cadre of expatriate writers. Selling and renting English language books, the store is an ideal counterpart to La Maison des Amis des Livres, the French bookshop across the street, run by Sylvia’s friend and soon-to-be lover, Adrienne Monnier. Thanks to Sylvia’s fluency in French, and to Adrienne, the French and English literary worlds converge in the ambit of the two shops, known as “Odeonia.” Ernest Hemingway, Ezra Pound, F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot (and somewhat less eagerly, Gertrude Stein) are only a few of the notables that frequent Shakespeare and Company. As readers become inured to the heady atmosphere of cafe society and intellectual ferment on the Left Bank, the book’s midsection sags. Apart from a poignant crisis concerning Sylvia's mother, the bookseller's professional involvement with James Joyce poses the main, if not the only, conflict in Maher’s book. As Joyce strives to complete the groundbreaking Ulysses, Sylvia’s store is his refuge. Of all the passing writers, Joyce is the most meticulously portrayed: his egg-shaped head, his ashplant cane, his dog phobia, his failing vision (due to glaucoma). Sylvia helps Joyce sort out his domestic chaos and pays for his treatment by her own eye doctor. When excerpts from Ulysses appear in a New York magazine whose editors are then prosecuted for disseminating smut, other publishers run scared. Into this pusillanimous void steps Sylvia. But after gargantuan struggles to publish Ulysses under her own aegis, will Sylvia reap the rewards of her literary valor, or at least of her loyalty to Joyce? That is the question that propels this plot.
A fine tribute to a tireless and selfless champion of literary genius.Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593102-18-3
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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