An engrossing but uneven tale about violent times in the West.
A historical novel that explores a tumultuous period in the American West.
When readers first meet Alexander Wells, the year is 1911. Wells is 76 years old and has been diagnosed with a brain tumor. He lives in Yreka, California, in relative calm despite a personal history marked by upheaval. He is, after all, one of the last of the “36 men who rode with Ben Wright on his punitive expedition into Modoc country in 1852.” But before the events of 1852 are explained, Harris’ story flashes back to 1908. Alexander visits a dying Shasta Native American named Tyee Bob. The encounter is not a pleasant one. Bob’s upset about a supposed event in 1851 in which American forces poisoned some 3,000 Shastas. This event causes Alexander to reflect on how he’s attempted to make “amends to the Indians in the small ways a small-town lawyer can” over the past 40 years. Back in August 1852, he was 17 and headed to Oregon as part of a wagon train from St. Louis with his family. All his parents wanted was “a piece of ground they could call their own and a chance to stand upright upon it.” They were in sight of Mount Shasta when Modoc Native Americans attacked their group. Both of Alexander’s parents were killed. By November 1852, he found himself with a contingent of Rangers on the Lost River. Ben Wright, a man who “don’t know the meanin’ of fear,” was in charge. Alexander engaged in some brutal activity, even killing Modoc children. The horrific assault signals the beginning of his turbulent journey in this age of the Gold Rush.
Later chapters shift to events like the McCloud lumber strike of 1909 in California. Whether the battles involve Native American tribes or immigrant workers, readers will soon realize that these are extraordinary times. This notion is advanced by real sources cited in the book, such as Life Amongst the Modocs (1873) by Joaquin Miller and the autobiography of U.S. Gen. George Crook (1828-1890), discovered years after his death and finally published in 1946. The former explains the excitement of panning for gold: “There lay the mines open to all who would work; no capital but a pick and pan required. The most manly and independent life on earth.” In contrast, Alexander’s narration can be less engaging. For instance, in one scene he relays a story from his life to his daughter. Alexander then tells readers her reaction: “In the wavering light of the fire, I see that her face is rapt with expectation.” Such mundane details tend to slow the narrative down. Nevertheless, Alexander makes his own fine points in this absorbing novel. He remarks how “time never passes at the proper rate, I think—it is always too slow or too fast.” He spotlights real-life, largely forgotten figures from American history like “Fearless Freddie Funston,” a general who fought in the Philippines “and later refused to apologize for his high-handed methods.” In Nevada in 1908, Funston put down a strike “so aggressively that even Roosevelt had to rein him in.” All in all, Harris’ book adroitly reveals aspects of America’s past that will stick with readers well after Alexander’s life story ends. An engrossing but uneven tale about violent times in the West.Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 9798632564786
Page Count: 378
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
A debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.
A high school senior pursues an affair with her teacher.
Seventeen-year-old Waldo, the narrator of McCurdy’s fiction debut, lives in Anchorage, Alaska, with her mother, though she’s long been the parent in their relationship. She heats her own frozen meals and pays the bills on time while her mom chases man after man and makes well-meaning promises she never keeps. Waldo blows her Victoria’s Secret wages on online shopping sprees and binges on junk food, inevitably crashing after the fleeting highs of her indulgences. Mr. Korgy, her creative writing teacher, has “thinning hair and nose pores”; he’s 40 years old and married with a child. Nevertheless—or possibly as a result?—Waldo’s attraction to him is “instant. So sudden it’s alarming. So palpable it’s confusing.” Mr. Korgy professes to want to keep their friendship aboveboard, but after a sexual encounter at the school’s winter formal that she initiates, an affair begins. Will this reckless pursuit be the one that actually satisfies Waldo, and is she as mature as she thinks she is? Waldo is a keen observer of people and provides sharp commentary on the punishing work of female beauty. Readers of McCurdy’s bestselling memoir, I’m Glad My Mom Died (2022), will surely be curious about the tumultuous mother-daughter relationship, and it is one of the novel’s highlights, full of realistic pity and anger and need. (“I want to scream at her. I want her to hug me.”) Unfortunately, the prose is often unwieldy and sometimes downright cringeworthy: When Waldo tells Mr. Korgy she loves him, “The words hang in the air in that constipated way they do when you know that you shouldn’t have said them.” Waldo frequently lists emotions and adjectives in triplicate, and events that could be significant aren’t sufficiently explored or given enough space to breathe before the novel races on to the next thing.
A debut novel with bright spots, but unbalanced and lacking in finesse.Pub Date: Jan. 20, 2026
ISBN: 9780593723739
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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