A sharp-witted, topical novel.
In Greason’s debut novel, three spurned women hatch a plan to destroy the man who hurt them.
At the advice of her Overeaters Anonymous sponsor, Dani Smith has taken to journaling about her negative feelings regarding the dissolution of her marriage. When she does, she finds that her entries portray her unfaithful rock-star ex-husband, Peter, dying in various painful or embarrassing ways. “Each morning, Dani awoke, heart fluttering, eager to stab, shoot, or poison Peter. She filled the blank pages of journals with the flames of her revenge fantasies until they caught fire and exploded into her blog, ‘Just Deserts,’ with (currently) sixty-one avid followers @just-deserts.” As Dani’s posts get more extreme, they garner more attention, including from other women who have known the pain of loving Peter. Red dated Peter in college before he left her suddenly for another woman—and then began a new relationship with him 20 years later that ended after only a few weeks when she learned she was pregnant and he was married. (Humiliated, Red terminated the pregnancy.) Red finds “Just Deserts” so cathartic that she seeks out Dani—who has just had her troubled 13-year-old niece thrust upon her—and befriends her. She’s impressed by Dani’s sick imagination, but she doesn’t want to waste it on blogs: She wants to destroy Peter’s life for real. The key to doing so may be Sasha, Peter’s current wife and former backup singer. Sasha is pregnant with twins, though she lives in fear that her husband will leave her for her tour replacement. Can these three women find common cause and bring down a guy who has broken hearts all over Los Angeles? To do so, they’ll first have to help one another rebuild their self-esteem.
Greason’s prose is precise and darkly comic, particularly the excerpts from Dani’s blog, which form their own short chapters. For legal reasons, Dani always refers to Peter as Steve, as here, where she fantasizes about poisoning a birthday meal: “Steve went into the bedroom and shut the door. I tiptoed after, listening for a moment to his soft whispers on the other side, and then I went into the kitchen, pulled the Drano out from under the sink, and stirred it slowly into the bubbling red sauce in the pot on the stove.” Though the premise is not entirely original, Greason pushes the plot deep into #MeToo territory in a way that gives it unexpected emotional heft. The characters, though heightened, are complex and believable, and the relationships that develop among Dani, Red, and Sasha—who have all served as “the other woman” in one another’s lives—are engrossing. The novel’s end is right out of one of Dani’s blog posts, and there’s a neatness to it all that doesn’t often happen in real-life #MeToo cases, but Greason keeps the book on the fine line between realism and farce. The result makes for a satisfying read that doesn’t take itself too seriously.
A sharp-witted, topical novel.Pub Date: July 26, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-956851-12-0
Page Count: 382
Publisher: TouchPoint Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 8, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
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
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