A fresh, not-yet-perfected approach to the New Age book.
An affluent, unhappy woman heals her psyche and spirit by finding her purpose in Murgel-Subotic’s debut novel.
Ysabel Meyer lives a life suited for the Real Housewives franchise: Her husband, Christian, is a successful businessman, and she writes for a respected magazine, going to weekly lunches with her girlfriends to discuss their new designer handbags. But she knows that, beneath all the artifice, she’s suffering, going through life “utterly detached” and “wandering aimlessly with no purpose” while dealing with an undiagnosed chronic illness. A fainting spell lands her in the hospital, and her young, precocious son, Elijah, begs her to try a different approach to her endless treatments. A visit to her psychologist, Dr. Ravi, reveals to Ysabel that her malaise is due to a spiritual deficit and a severed connection to the “Divine”; only through internal healing and embracing her spirituality might she find purpose and, by extension, happiness. This sets Ysabel on a new path: She attends cacao ceremonies, meditates, and spends quality time with her family rather than gossiping over salads and concerning herself with black-tie fundraisers and galas. Her latest magazine assignment is covering a new exhibit of Dark Ages and Renaissance artworks, and Ysabel begins to see parallels between the shifting artistic practices and her own desire “to be set free and emerge from the dark, and be reborn into the light.” Soon, she feels her personal changes and spiritual growth begin to reverberate through her relationships with family, friends, and work.
The author has not so much written a novel as constructed an allegory around the pillars and teachings of her own Divine awakening and the possibilities that await others who endeavor to look inward. As a result, the characters are essentially vessels for information as they come in and out of Ysabel’s journey when she needs guidance (“ ‘Tell yourself a different story,’ he suggests. ‘I learned on the internet everything in life is energy…so…change your thoughts to change your energy. Positive thoughts equal positive actions and positive actions equal positive feelings! Change your story. It seems simple to me’ ”) and for Divine spiritual teachings, often speaking in pageslong educational monologues. The book is not overly concerned with plot, as much of it explores the evolution of Ysabel’s search for her purpose while demonstrating that this goal can be attainable for readers who find themselves in similar ruts. This framing makes the text seem less intimidating, and perhaps more accessible, than a straightforward self-help or New Age book. There are small moments of tension when Ysabel’s friends and husband doubt the efficacy of her new practices and question her shifts in priorities, which lend the book a sense of realism that works to its benefit. While Ysabel’s internal and external work prove fruitful, the ending feels a bit far-fetched considering Ysabel’s initial ambitions. As a stand-in for the reader, she is easy to empathize with despite her privileged position, though the book does not address the personal and external obstacles that might prevent someone without Ysabel’s resources from achieving the same breakthroughs.
A fresh, not-yet-perfected approach to the New Age book.Pub Date: March 17, 2023
ISBN: 979-8887595559
Page Count: 278
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: May 29, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
