Operation Varsity Blues lurks behind this bracingly vicious portrait of entitlement.
When Stanford announces it will take only one additional student from the prestigious Elliott Bay Academy, applying to college suddenly becomes very dangerous. Is someone willing to kill for that spot?
Winnie Pressley is at the top of her senior class, so when her college counselor tells her she can't apply to Stanford, she’s devastated—but her mother, Maren, is suspicious. Are the two other top contenders also being advised to drop out of the race? Or does Winnie’s lower socio-economic status mean she’s no longer eligible for the school’s support? When Winnie lands in the hospital after a hit-and-run, the answers to those questions may imperil Maren, too. As a teenage single mother, Maren had to drop out of college herself, and she's worked hard to support her daughter. Currently, she’s the indispensable yet health insurance–free assistant to Alicia Stone, another Elliott Bay mom and the fabulously wealthy CEO of Aspyre, a posh lifestyle technology company. Alicia’s daughter, Brooke, has all the financial perks but she’s lacking the grades and ambition to be a Cardinal. Not quite as wealthy as Alicia but definitely more privileged than Maren, Kelly Vernon, the third mother in this tale, traffics in information. She knows everyone’s secrets (academic, philanthropic, and very personal). Her own daughter, Krissie, is a strong candidate for Stanford—plus she’s a double legacy—but her anxiety may get in her way. Toggling among the three mother-daughter pairs, Dobmeier and Katzman deftly capture the madness of college admissions season, from the expert-level parental manipulation of school administrators and the viper dens of parent cocktail parties to the women's tense home lives, riddled with unhealthy coping mechanisms. As secrets unfold, we witness the worst familial behavior; stolen DNA profiles and plagiarized essays are only the tip of the iceberg.
Operation Varsity Blues lurks behind this bracingly vicious portrait of entitlement.Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-1646-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark
Review Posted Online: Dec. 24, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2021
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
Great crime fiction.
An apparent suicide threatens to destroy an Irish farm town in the final volume of French’s Cal Hooper trilogy.
In the fictional western Ireland townland of Ardnakelty, “there’s a girl going after missing.” Soon young Rachel Holohan is found dead in the river. Shortly before, she had stopped at Lena Dunne’s home, and nothing had seemed amiss. The medical examiner determines she’d swallowed antifreeze, and he presumes she then fell from a bridge into the water. The medical examiner and the town agree she’d died by suicide. But there is far more to the plot: 16-year-old Trey Reddy thinks Tommy Moynihan murdered Rachel. Moynihan doles out favors and punishments to the local townsfolk, who know it’s best not to cross him. Now rumors spread that Moynihan wants land and has a secret plan to forcibly buy up parcels from the locals. A factory will be built, or a great big data center, or who knows what. If Tommy’s son, Eugene, can get elected to the local council, then compulsory purchase orders for land will follow, and the farms will disappear. Eugene, who’d been romantically involved with Rachel, is wonderfully described as “on the weedy edge of good-looking” and just fine as long as you “don’t have high expectations in the way of chins.” Lena is engaged to the American Cal Hooper, an ex-cop turned woodworker. They are “more or less raising” Trey, and these three core characters are drawn into the mystery of Rachel’s death and may have to face the looming clouds of civilizational change for Ardnakelty. Lena is chastised for “asking your wee questions all round the townland,” and Trey wants to quit school, against Cal’s advice. Finally, the story’s best line: “You can’t go killing people just because they deserve it.”
Great crime fiction.Pub Date: March 31, 2026
ISBN: 9780593493465
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Dec. 26, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2026
© 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.
