May speak to readers who are spiritually seeking; will likely frustrate those who aren’t.
An Irishwoman reflects on her romantic entanglements and spiritual awakening.
“My name is Anna, and for some time now, I have been trying to account for certain events in my life…which, from this vantage point of forty-five years, I often find baffling.” So commences Anna Hughes’ look back at her life, starting when she was 19, living in a Dublin bedsit, and about to begin her first job as a schoolteacher. The first of the “certain events” to which the middle-aged Anna alludes concerns her relationship with Peter Gallagher, an accountant she met at a nightclub. For Anna, their romance was meaningful (Peter was her first lover), insecurity-making (Anna secretly rifled through his things), and consuming: “I yearn to know him fully, deeply—I have no other mission.” Their relationship proceeded the way one might expect, which is emblematic of a problem throughout this careful, searching novel: Readers will always be one step ahead of Anna. Late in the book, when she finally realizes, “I’m easily swayed by other people’s ideas and opinions, believing them to be superior to my own,” readers will likely have a “No kidding” ready to go. There are wisps of an Edna O’Brien character in Anna, a country girl coming into awareness in the big city, and there are glimmers of a promising story about the lure of the extraordinary life versus the comforts of an ordinary one. But the narrative is bogged down with Anna’s thoughts on her dreams and on Jung, Camus, and, while she’s seeing a Muslim man, Islam. This only reinforces the notion that, while Anna is intellectually voracious, she doesn’t have an original thought in her head. That may be the novel’s point, but it does make for a tiresome protagonist.
May speak to readers who are spiritually seeking; will likely frustrate those who aren’t.Pub Date: March 24, 2026
ISBN: 9781324106173
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: Dec. 20, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 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
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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