A bleak but psychologically insightful portrait of family dynamics.
These people are related—but can they relate?
Berne, who won the Orange Prize for A Crime in the Neighborhood, her 1997 debut, and more recently charmed readers with the social satire The Dogs of Littlefield (2016), chooses a tight focus for her latest: the tense dynamics of three troubled individuals as they play out over a few days in rural Vermont. Marika is a Dutch survivor of the Nazi occupation; she lives alone in a run-down cottage by a lake, where the action occurs. Marika has been only barely in touch with her daughter, Lorna, whom she abandoned along with her husband and son when the children were young, resurfacing more than 30 years later, after the birth of Lorna's son. Lorna is a therapist whose husband has recently left her for another woman and moved to the West Coast; she is dealing with the return from college of her 19-year-old, Adam, after a traumatic experience he will not share—nor has she ever told him about her mother's abandonment. Following his mysterious humiliation, Adam has embarked on what he thinks of as a "scourge" that involves, among other things, rejecting the first-person pronoun and proper names. He is A, his parents are X and Y, and this makes the first chapter, written from his perspective, a tough read. "A did away with I. I=Death." When Lorna learns that Marika has sprained her ankle and needs family assistance, she asks Adam to accompany her on the road trip. He agrees only as part of his self-abnegation project but then finds he has a more positive response to his gruff, unappealing grandmother than to what he sees as his pathetic, approval-seeking mom. Lorna, though miserable, is smart enough to see what's going on. "People who suffered a trauma often felt that if it went unmentioned it was containable, which led to intimacy issues." So Marika's not talking about her very dark war experience, Lorna's not talking about her childhood, and Adam sure as hell isn't telling what happened at college. Until they all do.
A bleak but psychologically insightful portrait of family dynamics.Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-476-79426-6
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Marysue Rucci Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2022
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
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.
A struggling writer finds an unexpected muse when a mysterious man shows up at her cabin.
Petra Rose used to pump out a bestselling book every six months, but then the adaptation happened—that is, the disastrous film adaptation of her most famous book. The movie changed the book’s storyline so egregiously that fans couldn’t forgive her, and the ensuing harassment sent Petra into hiding and gave her a serious case of writer’s block. Petra’s one hope is her solo writing retreat at a remote cabin, where she can escape the distractions of real life and focus on her next book, a story about a woman having an affair with a cop. When officer Nathaniel Saint shows up at her cabin door, inspiration comes flooding back. Much like the character from Petra’s book, Saint is married, and he’s willing to be Petra’s muse, helping her get into her characters’ heads. Petra’s book is practically writing itself, but is the game she’s playing a little too dangerous? Does she know when to stop—and, more importantly, is Saint willing to stop? Hoover is no stranger to controversial movie adaptations and internet backlash, but she clarifies in a note to readers that she’s “just a writer writing about a writer” and that no further connections to her own life are contained in these pages—which is a good thing, because the book takes some horrifying twists and turns. Petra finds herself inexplicably attracted to Saint, even as she describes him as “such an asshole,” and her feelings for him veer between love and hate. The novel serves as a meta commentary on the dark romance genre—as Petra puts it, “Even though, as readers, we wouldn’t want to live out some of the fantasies we read about, it doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy reading those things.”
A dark and twisty look at just how far one woman is willing to go to find inspiration.Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
ISBN: 9781662539374
Page Count: -
Publisher: Montlake
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
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