A dark, stylish tale that revels in its ambiguity.
A lowly man searches for a way out of a seemingly inescapable City in this dystopian noir.
Wellington Thorneycroft makes his money from stealing, mostly pickpocketing. Many others survive in the enigmatic City by becoming Factory workers. But Thorneycroft is a loner who frequently partakes of alcohol and Ambrosia (a variety of psychoactive pills). One day, he’s taken aback by a strange woman he encounters whose voice he hears in his head: “We’ll escape together.” His friend Dempsey suggests the woman is a nymph called Lilith, one of the compassionate beings whose apparent expulsion from the City coincided with the construction of the Wall. When Felix, the thuggish individual who runs the City, later offers Thorneycroft a job, Lilith’s voice tells him to take it. The gig is nothing new to Thorneycroft, since it involves burglary, until Lilith directs him to a blueprint. He has to hide it from Felix, who quickly discovers he’s stashing it. The blueprint may hold the key to escaping outside the Wall, as scaling it is evidently impossible. With help from Lilith, Thorneycroft undertakes the perilous task of infiltrating the Factory, where the City’s exit ostensibly resides. Richardson coats his short, engaging novel in a gleefully dense atmosphere. Thorneycroft, for example, is periodically in a hazy state, either Ambrosia-induced or involving dreams that sometimes seem more real than not. Likewise, the bleak story is deliberately vague, including the mysterious past event known as the Transformation and Lilith’s evasive responses to Thorneycroft’s questions. But the author gives the City a strong pulse, particularly in the vivid descriptions of its relentless heat: “The room had no windows or air conditioning or even a fan. The air was heavy and hellishly hot, so hot it burned my throat to breathe it.” The indelible ending, despite the resolution, is open to interpretation.
A dark, stylish tale that revels in its ambiguity. (about the author)Pub Date: June 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-951150-31-0
Page Count: 178
Publisher: New Pulp Press
Review Posted Online: April 14, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Though uneven, this is still a pleasurable, comforting read.
Infertility, family secrets, and alpacas all figure in Quindlen’s latest meditation on mothering and domesticity.
Polly’s life looks enviable. Happily married to the adoring Mark—a vet at the Bronx Zoo—she teaches English at a private Manhattan girls’ school and loves her work. She has a protective older brother and close girlfriends, who’ve formed a book club where no one is expected to read the book. But Polly desperately wants a child and, at 42, knows time is running out. She and Mark have gone through endless fertility treatments, to no avail. Meantime, Polly’s friends have given her a DNA kit as a jokey birthday gift, and something mysterious shows up in the test results. Then, out of nowhere, a young woman contacts her, suggesting they may be related. That’s not all: Polly feels estranged from her mother, a revered judge who’s insufficiently maternal in her daughter’s view. Her father has always cherished her, but he’s in a nursing home now with a rapidly failing mind. And something is amiss with her best pal, Sarah. Quindlen’s trademark empathy is evident throughout, and her wry humor leavens some of the serious goings-on. Early on, Mark and Polly visit a fertility clinic with photos of babies in the waiting room; for Polly, “it felt…like a Weight Watchers facility with hot fudge sundae pictures on the wall.” Then we meet these charming alpacas, humming and pronking, on a farm run by an earth mother, whose wisdom will help Polly get on with her life. The plot swerves around a bit, there may be one surplus narrative thread (e.g., Polly’s star student Josephine running aground after graduation), and at the end, the author ties things up too neatly, pushing the “circle of life” theme too hard.
Though uneven, this is still a pleasurable, comforting read.Pub Date: Feb. 24, 2026
ISBN: 9780593734605
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
