There’s plenty here for Ojeda’s fans, but the glass needs a lot of cleaning before one can see through the window.
Seekers of all stripes congregate in the Andean páramo for a mystical music festival.
Noa and Nicole, 18, best friends, make the pilgrimage from their hometown of Guayaquil, Ecuador, a place rocked by the violence of men and mountains alike. Noa is on the hunt for her father, who left her as a child, and Nicole is focused on Noa, tied to her in the intensely intimate friendship of young women. Once at the festival, Solar Noise, they connect with others: Pamela and her partner, Fabio; Pedro and his partner, Carla; Mario and his friends Adriana and Julián. They mosh, do shrooms, have sex, dance with Diablumas, listen to songstresses, and congregate around a mysterious figure known as the Poet. Over the days of the festival, Noa seems to transform, unlocking an inner voice as powerful as the volcanic landscape. Interspersed with the events of the festival are selections from Noa’s father’s notebook, reporting on a long-ago visit from Noa and Nicole. Chapter headings tell us 10 years have passed on the Andean calendar; narrative cues tell us the passage of time here does not align with our usual linear conception. Outside of the journal, the novel’s narrative voice is a rotating first-person that visits the minds of Nicole, Mario, Pamela, and Pedro in turn, with diffusely mythological interludes by the festival songstresses themselves. Each voice feels less like a singular character and more like a member of the chorus, just another thread in the novel’s tangled web of words and ideas. Tonally, too, the prose—resonant, brusquely declarative—is often reminiscent of classical theater. It’s an approach that reflects its subject matter, leaving the impression of a symphony underpinning the world. At the same time, polyphonic narrative satisfies best when each character brings a truly unique perspective, and, in reaching for cohesion, Ojeda’s characters flounder for distinction. Pamela is the standout, the one character instantly discernible from the novel’s morass, regardless of context.
There’s plenty here for Ojeda’s fans, but the glass needs a lot of cleaning before one can see through the window.Pub Date: May 12, 2026
ISBN: 9781566897556
Page Count: 250
Publisher: Coffee House
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
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
An existential crisis that steps on its own final moments.
With only a month left until the world ends due to a swiftly approaching black hole, Don and Rodney, a retired gay couple, road-trip from Maine to Washington to spend their final days with their son.
After reports that a planet-swallowing black hole is making its way toward Earth, Rodney and Don—who have been together for 40 years and survived everything from homophobia to the HIV crisis—decide to pack their belongings into an RV, say goodbye to their neighbors, and travel from Camden, Maine, to Washington to uphold a promise to spend their final days with their son. They can’t wait any longer, since there’s already chaos around the country: “Military vehicles in the streets of most cities and towns. Looting, rioting, the burning of cars and buildings and people, all of it had already happened.” As they make their way west across the country, they encounter fellow travelers ranging from close-knit families to free-spirited hippies, some of whom have come to terms with the impending end of the world and others who haven’t. While the story seems to be asking readers what they would do if they had 30 days left to live, and reflects on what different kinds of acceptance might look like in the face of unavoidable tragedy, it loses some of its poignancy in a series of thinly padded monologues about the meaning of life. Clearly intended to pack an emotional punch, it’s failed by an abrupt ending, and the way the journey’s mystery—which will be obvious to many readers—is revealed by an info dump in the last chapter.
An existential crisis that steps on its own final moments.Pub Date: April 28, 2026
ISBN: 9781250881236
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
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