The complicated circuitry behind family alliances and breakdowns is artfully revealed.
In 13 stories centered on several generations of the Collinses and their friends and acquaintances, Sanders examines the complex dynamics of a large Black family.
Launching the collection is “The Good, Good Men,” which describes the efforts of Theo and Miles MacHale to protect their mother, Lee Collins, from what they perceive to be yet another in a series of freeloading men (a duty first imposed on them in childhood by their soon-to-be absent father). In “Rule Number One,” Bellamy Lamb recounts the life lessons imparted to her over the years by her dying mother, Suzette Collins, lessons ignored or forgotten or disparaged by Bellamy’s younger sister, Aubrey. Janet, a disappointed and sidelined mother-in-law (and a dean at the university where Cassandra Collins is the provost), mulls over her long-term friendship with “Stephanie fucking Simmons,” a woman who, despite a history of petty differences, provides moral support and comfort in “The Gatekeepers.” The Collins brood is depicted at the beginning of the book in a handwritten family tree, complete with corrections, that serves as a directory to the characters, some of whose given names mature into nicknames as they age. The stories take place over several recent generations and are, primarily, set in the Washington, D.C., region (with some of the younger set venturing to Brooklyn). The passage of time allows Sanders to show slow growth (sometimes of resentment) and the repetition of behavior across generations. Subtly crafted and sometimes ending equivocally, the stories gradually reveal motivations and perspectives that aren’t obvious at first. The difficult aspects of negotiating family relationships are gently examined but, more interestingly, respected in their recounting.
The complicated circuitry behind family alliances and breakdowns is artfully revealed.Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2023
ISBN: 9781644452516
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Graywolf
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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