A gripping, cozy drama about the careers and lives of teachers.
Three educators at different points in their careers navigate life and work in a small town in Culbertson’s novel.
After an entitled parent accosts her in her prep school’s parking lot (“he shoved me into my car door and split open my forehead”), 45-year-old Chelsea Garden flees her life and 12-year teaching career in the San Francisco Bay Area for her hometown of Imperial Flats in Northern California. For Chelsea, Imperial Flats holds a lifetime of memories that have haunted her since she left, including an antagonistic relationship with her mother and a not-quite romance with her best friend and first love, Evan Dawkins. Failed musician Evan has moved home to care for his ailing father and teach music at the high school that both he and Chelsea attended. A chance meeting at the local supermarket reignites the spark between the two educators, and they attempt to reconstruct their relationship while navigating the complications of middle age, including the presence of Evan’s 9-year-old daughter. Meanwhile, the school principal, Nora Delgado, is feeling the weight of a decades-long career and coping with her recent divorce. When a dedicated but burned-out English teacher resigns from the high school, Nora offers Chelsea a job as a long-term substitute, and the lives of the three lead characters become ever more entwined. Written by a career educator, this story offers a rare glimpse into the complex lives of teachers, engaging readers in a middle-aged coming-home narrative and inviting them to reflect on the struggles faced by contemporary teachers nationwide. Culbertson’s prose is enthralling without being melodramatic and witty without being overly lighthearted. Every character is lovingly constructed with empathy and imbued with complexity, making them relatable and likable. Readers will get lost in the story and come away having learned a few of the hard lessons that our teachers were trying to impart all along.
A gripping, cozy drama about the careers and lives of teachers.Pub Date: Aug. 5, 2025
ISBN: 9781960573438
Page Count: 344
Publisher: Sibylline Press
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.
Best friends confront feelings for each other when they take a honeymoon trip together.
Francesca Gardiner and George Saint James have always been best friends—just like Jo and Laurie from Little Women, which they both love. Frankie has a big, complicated family and George was the boy next door who’d moved in with his eccentric grandmother. Their friendship survived childhood, awkward teenage years, and living together as young adults without ever venturing into the romantic—well, except for one kiss, but they don’t talk about that. When Frankie gets engaged to an older professor named Nate, George isn’t happy and a huge fight ensues. Despite his misgivings, George shows up to be her best man, but Nate leaves Frankie right before the wedding with only a cryptic letter. Devastated, Frankie goes to a friend’s house to recuperate, but her honeymoon is already planned and paid for—so she decides to travel to Tofino, a picturesque town on the coast of Vancouver Island, with George taking Nate’s place. Frankie wants to fix her friendship with George, but now that they’re in a romantic suite in a beautiful location, things are more complicated than ever. She’d always thought a relationship would be a bad idea, but she’s slowly beginning to realize they’ll never be able to go back to being kids. Maybe the only way forward involves forging a new kind of relationship. Fortune, the author of romances like This Summer Will Be Different (2024), returns with another love story full of longing and intense angst. The many allusions to Little Women are charming, and Frankie is a delightfully headstrong, feisty character. She and George have explosive chemistry, and Fortune manages to make the “will-they-or-won’t-they” nature of their relationship feel like life-or-death stakes.
A powerfully strong romance for readers who like their love stories full of torment and passion.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9780593953242
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
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
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