Clever, charming, and always on message.
In a town about to be ravaged for a second time by an evil chemical company, teenage triplets fight the power.
One is typical, and her name has one syllable: Mab. Two is on the spectrum, and her name has two syllables: Monday. Three cannot eat, speak, or walk, has the full use of only one arm and hand, and is a genius: Mirabel. The Mitchell girls' father was one of many from the town of Bourne who died before the poisoning of the water supply became so severe that the factory producing it, the town's single employer, was shut down. Since then Bourne has been nearly evacuated; everyone left is disabled and/or unemployed; you still can't drink the water or even risk more than a few seconds in the shower. One of the only businesses left is the Do Not Shop (donuts with a typo); the high school has separate tracks for those who need "extra help with their bodies" and those who need extra help with their brains; the library is closed. What books were not sold off were rescued by Monday Mitchell and stored under beds and in the microwave, but she can find any one of them in a minute. The triplets' mother, Nora, has been trying unsuccessfully for years to mount a class action suit—and now the Templeton family, who owns the factory, is returning to town with plans to reopen! Despite the hotness of their teenage son, River—two out of three triplets fall in love with him—they must be stopped. After This Is How it Always Is (2017), about raising a transgender child, Frankel has given us another socially conscious 21st-century fable in a voice that is part pastor, part political speechwriter, and part Fannie Flagg. As she puts it (this is Mirabel talking), "There are two kinds of people in this world: the ones who split the world into two kinds of people, and the ones who know that's reductive and conversationally lazy." And the ones who will love this book and the ones who...oh forget, it.
Clever, charming, and always on message.Pub Date: June 8, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-23677-7
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
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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