A big-hearted, often amusing tale of the weirdness of suburbia.
Suburban neighbors hunt for a mysterious interloper in Semegran’s novel.
Seff leads a quiet life with his wife in suburban Austin, Texas. Usually, the most colorful part of his day is sharing a few beers on the deck with his neighbor Big Dave, the proud sort of Texan who thinks nothing of shooting at a squirrel on his roof with a silenced Glock. When pets start to go missing around the neighborhood, Seff and Dave form a task force to get to the bottom of the mystery. The two men are soon surveilling the area with video cameras, chasing after shadowy figures in the dark, and getting pepper-sprayed by teens for their trouble. Just as they are about to give up, they capture something sinister on the cameras: a ghostly, glowing, naked figure wearing only running shoes and a pair of pantyhose pulled over his head. “[L]ooking like a naked bank robber ready for a jog—a thin and lanky, athletic, white praying mantis—he got really close to the camera and waved,” narrates Seff in horror. The only option, as they see it, is to form a posse to bring down this deranged culprit. Can the neighborhood—and Seff and Dave’s friendship—survive their ad hoc vigilantism? The novel takes the form of a series of vignettes depicting life in the neighborhood interspersed between chapters related more directly to Seff and Big Dave’s quest. Their odd-couple friendship—Seff is a progressive writer-type while Big Dave is an unapologetically MAGA plumber—forms the heart of the book. Semegran eschews injecting serious political conflict into the relationship, presenting Dave as a self-aware sitcom reactionary. “She is missing,” Big Dave chides Seff when he misgenders a dog. “You gotta get the pronouns of all the animals correct these days or the kids will cancel your ass on the interwebs and the social apps and such.” In a time of political polarization, the author offers an encouraging tale of neighborliness and camaraderie in the face of the unknown.
A big-hearted, often amusing tale of the weirdness of suburbia.Pub Date: March 4, 2025
ISBN: 9798218415945
Page Count: 236
Publisher: Mutt Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 2, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
SEEN & HEARD
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.
A French art historian’s English-language fiction debut combines the story of a loving relationship between a grandfather and granddaughter with an enlightening discussion of art.
One day, when 10-year-old Mona removes the necklace given to her by her now-dead grandmother, she experiences a frightening, hour-long bout of blindness. Her parents take her to the doctor, who gives her a variety of tests and also advises that she see a psychiatrist. Her grandfather Henry tells her parents that he will take care of that assignment, but instead, he takes Mona on weekly visits to either the Louvre, the Musée d’Orsay, or the Centre Pompidou, where each week they study a single work of art, gazing at it deeply and then discussing its impact and history and the biography of its maker. For the reader’s benefit, Schlesser also describes each of the works in scrupulous detail. As the year goes on, Mona faces the usual challenges of elementary school life and the experiences of being an only child, and slowly begins to understand the causes of her temporary blindness. Primarily an amble through a few dozen of Schlesser’s favorite works of art—some well known and others less so, from Botticelli and da Vinci through Basquiat and Bourgeois—the novel would probably benefit from being read at a leisurely pace. While the dialogue between Henry and the preternaturally patient and precocious Mona sometimes strains credulity, readers who don’t have easy access to the museums of Paris may enjoy this vicarious trip in the company of a guide who focuses equally on that which can be seen and the context that can’t be. Come for the novel, stay for the introductory art history course.
A pleasant if not entirely convincing tribute to the power of art.Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2025
ISBN: 9798889661115
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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