Important questions are raised, but inexpert writing and one-dimensional characters detract from the story.
Three Black women navigate racism, classism, and marriage in Sweden.
This is the sequel to In Every Mirror She’s Black (2021), in which three women of color linked in different ways to the same wealthy man navigate the treacherous ground of entitlement, race, and class in one of the most progressive countries in the world. Sweden is often held up as a paragon of inclusive virtue, but for the women in this novel, racism doesn’t stay hidden beneath the surface. Kemi Adeyemi, a powerhouse marketing executive at the firm owned by CEO Johan “Jonny” von Lundin, finds her career in jeopardy when she embarks on a tumultuous affair with a married white colleague. Jonny’s wife, Brittany-Rae, exists in a world of wealth and privilege but finds herself stifled by her husband’s obsessive behavior and believes she’s only a fetish to him. Muna Saheed, a Somali refugee who played a role in the first novel, remains in a coma for most of this book, but her storyline continues through the eyes of her friend Yasmiin Çelik, an immigrant from Mogadishu who must confront the painful secrets of her past—and her husband’s secrets, too. Åkerström paints a harsh portrait of the insidious bigotry in Swedish society, exploring the pressures on Black women to constantly remain strong and unassailable, because making a mistake will never be forgiven. The author also tackles necessary questions about tokenism and economic advantages in an insular society, but the writing doesn’t match the thematic depth of the material. A possible murder plot feels like a sensational distraction, and characters often register as one-dimensional. In the sex scenes, there are so many heaving chests and men “claiming” women that the book feels like an old-fashioned bodice-ripper instead of the important novel it could be.
Important questions are raised, but inexpert writing and one-dimensional characters detract from the story.Pub Date: Oct. 24, 2023
ISBN: 9780063316973
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Fans of Stockett’s bestselling debut will love this engaging follow-up.
Stockett heads to Mississippi for another historical novel about feisty women.
This time, perhaps recalling criticisms of cultural appropriation in The Help (2009), she sticks to feisty white women, with one exception. The setting is Oxford in 1933. For two miserable years, 11-year-old Meg has lived in “the Orphan,” a county asylum for parentless girls. Chairlady Garnett—a villain so one-note she’d twirl a mustache if she had one—makes it her mission to ostracize the older girls she deems unadoptable, stigmatizing them as offspring of the “feebleminded” mothers who abandoned them. She particularly has it in for smart, sassy Meg, who refuses to believe her mother’s mysterious disappearance was deliberate. Elsewhere in Oxford, Birdie Calhoun comes to visit her sister Frances, who married a wealthy banker, to ask for money on behalf of their mother and grandmother back in Footely. Frances isn’t thrilled by this reminder of her impoverished small-town origins. But she’s trying to climb up in Oxford society by volunteering at the Orphan, the asylum’s books need to be done before the state inspector shows up in a few weeks, and Birdie is a bookkeeper. Having neatly arranged to keep Birdie in town and draw these two storylines together, Stockett goes on to spin a compulsively readable yarn with enough plot for a half-dozen novels. Birdie and Meg become friends, Meg is adopted despite Garnett’s best efforts, Meg’s mother turns up at the Orphan demanding to know where her child is—and that’s less than a quarter of the way through a long, winding narrative that keeps piling on more dramatic developments until all loose ends are neatly, if hastily, wrapped up in the final pages. Stockett might be making a point about Southern women facing facts and standing up for themselves, but mostly this is just a satisfyingly twisty tale that should make a great miniseries.
Fans of Stockett’s bestselling debut will love this engaging follow-up.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9781954118812
Page Count: 656
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
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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