A dizzying, lush flight through the ecstasy and devastation of an incendiary romance and the grief that follows its loss.
In a whirlwind of queer eroticism, classical strings, and vernal sensuality, debut novelist Delabroy-Allard whips up a bracing portrait of consumptive love and mutual obsession.
A young mother and new teacher in Paris has found herself adrift, “living a life [she] never thought [she’d] live” following her husband’s sudden departure. Left to raise their young daughter alone, the unnamed narrator “walk[s] around like a ghost,” the sudden shift in identity rendering her vulnerable, transparent, thrust into "a period of latency." Drawing her back into the world and its fecund, proliferating springtime is Sarah, a woman she met at a New Year's party who has quickly woven herself into the fabric of the narrator’s life, sparking off a liminal hum of possibility that buzzes between them. Sarah, a successful violinist who darts in and out of the city on tour with her quartet, is too much in every respect—she drinks too much, smokes too many cigarettes, wears too much makeup, is too loud, too magnetic. In her faded and fragile state, the narrator absorbs Sarah's radiance until she too begins first to shine, then burn as their unsustainable passion increasingly erupts in violence and despair. Each time Sarah departs and returns, the narrator is torn apart and stitched back together, until finally she's worn too thin for further repair. While the cumulative effect of repetition can at times slow rather than drive the swell of the narrative's crescendo, overall the prose exerts a tidal pull, and the book's structure skillfully mirrors the story's atmosphere: The short vignettes that constitute Part I replicate the breathless swirl of the narrator's turbulent affair with Sarah while lengthening chapters throughout Part II reflect her descent into rambling dishevelment and a sense of being stuck in time. In this second half, the narrator flees Paris for Italy in a frantic attempt to resurrect herself from the ashes of her devastation when her relationship with Sarah finally collapses beneath the weight of its own fraught history.
A dizzying, lush flight through the ecstasy and devastation of an incendiary romance and the grief that follows its loss.Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-63542-985-5
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Other Press
Review Posted Online: April 12, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
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 welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.
A falsely accused Black man goes into hiding in this masterful novella by Wright (1908-1960), finally published in full.
Written in 1941 and '42, between Wright’s classics Native Son and Black Boy, this short novel concerns Fred Daniels, a modest laborer who’s arrested by police officers and bullied into signing a false confession that he killed the residents of a house near where he was working. In a brief unsupervised moment, he escapes through a manhole and goes into hiding in a sewer. A series of allegorical, surrealistic set pieces ensues as Fred explores the nether reaches of a church, a real estate firm, and a jewelry store. Each stop is an opportunity for Wright to explore themes of hope, greed, and exploitation; the real estate firm, Wright notes, “collected hundreds of thousands of dollars in rent from poor colored folks.” But Fred’s deepening existential crisis and growing distance from society keep the scenes from feeling like potted commentaries. As he wallpapers his underground warren with cash, mocking and invalidating the currency, he registers a surrealistic but engrossing protest against divisive social norms. The novel, rejected by Wright’s publisher, has only appeared as a substantially truncated short story until now, without the opening setup and with a different ending. Wright's take on racial injustice seems to have unsettled his publisher: A note reveals that an editor found reading about Fred’s treatment by the police “unbearable.” That may explain why Wright, in an essay included here, says its focus on race is “rather muted,” emphasizing broader existential themes. Regardless, as an afterword by Wright’s grandson Malcolm attests, the story now serves as an allegory both of Wright (he moved to France, an “exile beyond the reach of Jim Crow and American bigotry”) and American life. Today, it resonates deeply as a story about race and the struggle to envision a different, better world.
A welcome literary resurrection that deserves a place alongside Wright’s best-known work.Pub Date: April 20, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-59853-676-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Library of America
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2021
BOOK TO SCREEN
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