A daring Afrofuturist debut that just scratches the surface of its own astonishing futures.
An archivist grapples with Covid-19-induced memory loss and meddling AI helper bots while preserving an account of humanity’s radical survival.
In 2035, Xandria Anastasia Brown is the curator of African American Ephemera at the Huntington Library in Los Angeles, crafting a mosaic of Black history through quotidian artifacts. When a protest against corporate influence on the library escalates into an institution-wide lockdown, Xandria is sequestered in her office; there, she must confront the ramifications of her persistent brain fog, monitored and prodded by a trio of artificial intelligences. Initially functioning as personal assistants and health bots, the AIs' competing attempts to preserve her quality of life have a direct impact on Xandria’s passion project: collecting the ephemera of Diwata, an undersea nation inspired by Octavia E. Butler and the Black Panther Party, created in response to environmental trauma and in opposition to the colonies created to plunder Mars. Xandria’s framework is broad; she includes seemingly inconsequential objects to give future scholars the full picture of Diwata. That modus operandi is reflected in Jackson’s novel, which displays an astonishing breadth of imagination spanning centuries—there's everything from a far-future symposium attended by an immortal Xandria to an exploration of Diwata’s origins and feuding factions—but it only dips into each setting. Jackson draws thought-provoking parallels between Xandria cataloguing artifacts and the bots in turn cataloguing her physical symptoms, emotional reactions, and other biomedical data. The novel posits a future in which AI can bridge the gap of humans’ limitations, taking care of us when we can’t take care of each other, yet acknowledges the violations of privacy and autonomy that will be required. Jackson makes audacious leaps forward in time and space, from a lifespan-enhancing genetic operation performed against Xandria’s will to a sentient rover bursting out of the Pacific Ocean and not stopping until it reaches Mars. Readers may wish they could take deeper dives into each of these breathtaking vignettes.
A daring Afrofuturist debut that just scratches the surface of its own astonishing futures.Pub Date: April 1, 2025
ISBN: 9781324093404
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Liveright/Norton
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2025
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
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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