A romance barbed with wit and humor.
An American becomes entranced by a Romanian figure skater in this novel of intersecting lives and Cold War hostilities.
As soon as he finishes his military service, Miles Nelson decides to enjoy the scenery: “After my Army hitch, I became European tumbleweed.” In Prague, he meets Matt, another expat and an adventurous hippie, and the two of them enjoy sampling Czech beer together. When Matt convinces Miles they should crash the Olympics in nearby Innsbruck, Austria, Miles has his first encounter with Simone Albescu, a Romanian figure skater who captures his attention. Simone is good but clearly not the best. As Miles puts it, “Her leaps were low-altitude demonstrations of power, but her moves were exceedingly graceful and polished.” He goes on: “To say that I found her attractive would be a lie, but there was a quality of intelligence and determination that earned my instant admiration.” Improbably, she later introduces herself to him and vigorously shakes his hand. Only later does Miles realize Simone is staging a small rebellion against her authoritarian overlords, who wish to control her every move. Miles and Simone next meet in Chicago, where Miles, working for a posh hotel, is able to assist her when her coach defects to the U.S, escaping their assigned Romanian security handlers. Their lives go on: Miles ends up in Cedar Falls, Iowa, where he falls for a woman named Ellen Good but can’t figure out why he holds back from her. Of course, it’s because of the figure skater, who reenters his life after her own defection. As Simone struggles to find a life beyond skating, and away from her Romanian family and home, Miles finds yet another opportunity to help her—and to make a bid for her affections.
The writing is engaging, guided by Miles’ intelligent and sharp-edged humor. His eloquent voice gives the novel plenty of sentence-level pleasures. Williams has an impressive eye for descriptions and analogies, which stud the narrative like well-cut gems. His powers grant Miles a voice adept at describing people and places. Of Ohio, Miles notes: “Ohio is, alas, Ohio. It is an unsatisfactory mix between corporate and agricultural America.” Of his military career, Miles states: “I shot up the ranks like a Fourth-of-July rocket” and then “slammed into the apathy wall.” He describes a shocked character whose “eyes changed color,” and he notes how Ellen “injected little jests into the conversation.” Ellen is a puzzling piece in the book, a charming presence Miles loves and takes for granted. “I fell in love with her instantly,” he confesses, but he does all he can to ensure they drift apart. When he finally admits to himself that he’s loved Simone for years, his hesitance makes more sense. Occasionally, Williams strains too hard for an erudite tone, giving the prose a grating and inhuman stiffness: “I was never morose, but felicity never found me there” is how Miles explains his unease with Chicago. Similarly, Miles’ wiseacre routine and penchant for drollery grow a little tiresome; fortunately, Williams gives him redeeming moments of sincerity. “It’s you I want,” he says to Simone. “I’ve loved you for years.”
A romance barbed with wit and humor.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-951886-60-8
Page Count: 276
Publisher: Book Vine Press
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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