An unsettling tale, often depressing, but nonetheless an addictive read.
A teenage girl impulsively decides to run away with a smooth-talking carnival barker in Cox’s novel.
In the April of 1932, 8-year-old Leonora (Nora) DeLorenzo and her younger sister, Patricia (Patsy), have just been taken away from their mother, Gertie DeLorenzo, and placed in The Park Ridge School for Girls outside Chicago. Gertie has been deemed an unfit mother, accused by a neighbor of being a prostitute and leaving her young children alone in their small apartment. Every other Sunday, the girls wait for Gertie to show up on visiting day, hoping she will bring them back home—but they are bitterly disappointed each time. The narrative jumps back to 1923: Gertie Gufftason is a restless teenager, one of her parents’ 11 children living in the ramshackle southern Iowan mining town of Keystone. The carnival has come to town, and the star performer is country singer Patsy Montana, who Gertie idolizes. As her parents and siblings go off in different directions, Gertie begins roaming the campgrounds on her own. She is approached by the exotic carnival barker “Lorenzo,” who offers to introduce her to Patsy Montana. Dazzled by the excitement of the carnival and Lorenzo’s carefully designed seduction, Gertie takes off with him when the carnival leaves town. Cox has woven a complex emotional melodrama filled with passion, betrayal, heartbreak, and, ultimately, forgiveness. She deftly captures the poverty and social signals of the Depression (“Keystone wasn’t even a real town, just a ramshackle collection of buildings surrounding a dirty hole in the ground, no different than any other of the many mining camps scattered across southern Iowa”), along with the psychological damage sustained by Nora and Patsy resulting from Gertie’s choices. Nora is the story’s hero, the strongest of the three female protagonists, always protecting the traumatized Patsy from the consequences of Gertie’s misbehavior during the decade they spend at Park Ridge, where punishments are frequent and cruel. A satisfying surprise revelation close to the novel’s end almost compensates for the rolling cascade of tragedies.
An unsettling tale, often depressing, but nonetheless an addictive read.Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 979-8988009702
Page Count: 379
Publisher: Woolton Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 22, 2023
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 dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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