Mostly effective tales of characters dealing with emotional departures.
A collection of five stories that focus on themes of nature and family.
In the titular story, Bridger Stills gathers sea urchins with his boatmate. He sells his catch for a low price to Fang Moon, Bridger’s girlfriend Maxie’s father, and the owner of Fang Moon Fish Company. Bridger also encounters his 18-year-old daughter, Gwynn, whom he hasn’t seen in years. In “Tropic of Angels,” 7-year-old Carthy and his mother, Yolanda, say goodbye to his father, who leaves to go out to sea. When Yolanda begins having strange visions, she’s taken away to San Isidro while Carthy stays behind with his grandfather. “Cloud Forest” follows Terence, whose life is described as “a continuum of pressing concerns.” His wife and his friend Timothy die, and after Timothy’s funeral, the dead man’s father gives Terence an enigmatic note about a cloud forest, which Terence seeks out. “Cedars of Lebanon” looks at the experience of Nadine, a Red Cross worker who responds to mountainside fires; she reminisces about when her father was alive and they would go on hikes to the nature reserve. In “Island of Lost Dreams,” a group of “ambitious and educated” young people long to leave the island on a fishing trawler, assigned to pick them up at nightfall. McCarey, who wrote Oceans Apart (2016), returns with a seamless and focused compilation of stories. Over the course of this collection, he presents readers with colorful descriptions of scenery, as in the opening line of “Moonglow Bay” (“The sky was swirling with the pastel colors of evening twilight as a fishing boat, the Floozie, made its way into the sheltered waters of Moonglow Harbor”), and there are plenty of tense, dynamic moments. A recurring theme of the connection between man and nature is clear and well developed. Characters are shown experiencing moments of loss and flights of nostalgia while also yearning for more in their present; most are relatable and revealed to have realistic thoughts and dreams, but a few depictions, such as those of Fang and Maxie, feel stereotypical and shallow.
Mostly effective tales of characters dealing with emotional departures.Pub Date: Aug. 21, 2021
ISBN: 979-8451272015
Page Count: 293
Publisher: Independently Published
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2021
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
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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