A fascinating premise and themes that can still speak to us today.
A retelling of Socrates’ story, set in a dystopian America in the 1830s.
In early-19th-century America, society is wild about the Greeks. Philadelphia, the capital, styles itself the Athens of America, and Greek names—or approximations—are very common. Thus, the young narrator is named Palleias, and the Socrates figure is “Teacher Scotes,” who behaves just the way Socrates did, courting the same dangers (such as purportedly corrupting the young, for example). One of Scotes’ acolytes is named Xephon (see Xenophon). But the Founding Fathers are long gone, and these epigones took the wrong lesson from the Greeks. This “democracy” is a nasty parody; it’s populism run amok. Whatever the people decide in a great assembly on any given day becomes the law, no matter how short-sighted or unjust. Has debt become burdensome? Well, abolish it, and too bad about the rich lenders! Palleias’ father, Antonyn, is a highly respected representative, one of those who certify the people’s will. He was once Scotes’ student but is now his enemy and forbids Palleias from associating with the man. All this comes to a head when Antonyn arranges to have Scotes arrested and charged with corrupting the youth, a capital offense. A core theme that is wonderfully handled is the inner torment of young Palleias, who’s drawn to Scotes but is also a dutiful son. The book has long passages of—what else?—Socratic dialogue, although Holland replicates that type of dialogue well, even if only the most committed students of philosophy might follow all of it (“But the people are a cauldron, and if boil they will, they still require time to heat”). It’s also a bit hard to believe that these citizens could be quite so fickle and self-serving. Palleias, who later assumes the mantle of Plato, talks some sense (and necessary shame) into his fellow compatriots in a rousing speech toward the end, even if they still have much work to do.
A fascinating premise and themes that can still speak to us today.Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9798891383104
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Mascot Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 17, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Fans of Stockett’s bestselling debut will love this engaging follow-up.
Stockett heads to Mississippi for another historical novel about feisty women.
This time, perhaps recalling criticisms of cultural appropriation in The Help (2009), she sticks to feisty white women, with one exception. The setting is Oxford in 1933. For two miserable years, 11-year-old Meg has lived in “the Orphan,” a county asylum for parentless girls. Chairlady Garnett—a villain so one-note she’d twirl a mustache if she had one—makes it her mission to ostracize the older girls she deems unadoptable, stigmatizing them as offspring of the “feebleminded” mothers who abandoned them. She particularly has it in for smart, sassy Meg, who refuses to believe her mother’s mysterious disappearance was deliberate. Elsewhere in Oxford, Birdie Calhoun comes to visit her sister Frances, who married a wealthy banker, to ask for money on behalf of their mother and grandmother back in Footely. Frances isn’t thrilled by this reminder of her impoverished small-town origins. But she’s trying to climb up in Oxford society by volunteering at the Orphan, the asylum’s books need to be done before the state inspector shows up in a few weeks, and Birdie is a bookkeeper. Having neatly arranged to keep Birdie in town and draw these two storylines together, Stockett goes on to spin a compulsively readable yarn with enough plot for a half-dozen novels. Birdie and Meg become friends, Meg is adopted despite Garnett’s best efforts, Meg’s mother turns up at the Orphan demanding to know where her child is—and that’s less than a quarter of the way through a long, winding narrative that keeps piling on more dramatic developments until all loose ends are neatly, if hastily, wrapped up in the final pages. Stockett might be making a point about Southern women facing facts and standing up for themselves, but mostly this is just a satisfyingly twisty tale that should make a great miniseries.
Fans of Stockett’s bestselling debut will love this engaging follow-up.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9781954118812
Page Count: 656
Publisher: Spiegel & Grau
Review Posted Online: Feb. 2, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2026
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