Ten artful stories conjure contemporary North Carolina, mouthwatering and matter-of-factly haunted.
Boars, monkeys, adulterers, charlatans, and ghosts all chase the characters gathered here.
The slyly soulful Kenan takes his time between books. Now he rewards readers who have waited almost three decades for a return to his fictional Tims Creek, North Carolina, home to the novel A Visitation of Spirits (1989) and the story collection Let the Dead Bury Their Dead (1992)—though this new collection opens with a smile by starting “When We All Get to Heaven” in New York City. A 58-year-old plumber from Tims Creek explores midtown and is improbably swept up into Billy Idol’s entourage. Ed Phelps finds the music silly but the day full, and as he drifts off to sleep, he hears his grandfather’s voice singing. This pitch-perfect ending is evocative of the thin, beckoning veil between the seen and unseen, the quotidian and the preposterous, that Kenan hangs throughout his fiction. Yet appetite—carnal and gustatory—also fuels these stories. In “I Thought I Heard the Shuffle of Angels’ Feet,” the narrator introduces his lover: “Six foot six inches of beige, Portuguese-accented brawn, the Brazilian wunderkind. He moved like a dancer, he spoke like a poet—and Americans are such suckers for accents.” He tops that poem with 15 words to sum up their union: “Ten tumultuous years. It had not been bliss, but mostly happy, usually fun, always interesting.” As this story ends, something new has begun and something old is set right. “The Eternal Glory That Is Ham Hocks” ladles the historical Howard Hughes into its fictional stew, delivering a nice kick. A Tims Creek diner—“The eggs are still greasy, the ham tough as shoe leather, the coffee fit for removing toilet clogs”—serves as backdrop. But do not imagine this a book of grits and honey. In the complex, mesmerizing “Resurrection Hardware; or, Lard & Promises,” the speaker shares the author’s first name inside a tale of ghosts, strivers, and roasted goose, “succulent, flavorful, the fat a thing of pure joy.” It is a feast.
Ten artful stories conjure contemporary North Carolina, mouthwatering and matter-of-factly haunted.Pub Date: Aug. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-324-00546-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2020
IN THE NEWS
PERSPECTIVES
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
Great crime fiction.
An apparent suicide threatens to destroy an Irish farm town in the final volume of French’s Cal Hooper trilogy.
In the fictional western Ireland townland of Ardnakelty, “there’s a girl going after missing.” Soon young Rachel Holohan is found dead in the river. Shortly before, she had stopped at Lena Dunne’s home, and nothing had seemed amiss. The medical examiner determines she’d swallowed antifreeze, and he presumes she then fell from a bridge into the water. The medical examiner and the town agree she’d died by suicide. But there is far more to the plot: 16-year-old Trey Reddy thinks Tommy Moynihan murdered Rachel. Moynihan doles out favors and punishments to the local townsfolk, who know it’s best not to cross him. Now rumors spread that Moynihan wants land and has a secret plan to forcibly buy up parcels from the locals. A factory will be built, or a great big data center, or who knows what. If Tommy’s son, Eugene, can get elected to the local council, then compulsory purchase orders for land will follow, and the farms will disappear. Eugene, who’d been romantically involved with Rachel, is wonderfully described as “on the weedy edge of good-looking” and just fine as long as you “don’t have high expectations in the way of chins.” Lena is engaged to the American Cal Hooper, an ex-cop turned woodworker. They are “more or less raising” Trey, and these three core characters are drawn into the mystery of Rachel’s death and may have to face the looming clouds of civilizational change for Ardnakelty. Lena is chastised for “asking your wee questions all round the townland,” and Trey wants to quit school, against Cal’s advice. Finally, the story’s best line: “You can’t go killing people just because they deserve it.”
Great crime fiction.Pub Date: March 31, 2026
ISBN: 9780593493465
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Dec. 26, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
