This restless, intentionally unsettling novel establishes Porter as a distinctive, confident literary voice.
Deep in the heart of the Covid-19 lockdown, a pregnant Brooklynite goes missing.
Porter’s sophomore novel again features a large cast of diverse New Yorkers, this time met during the spring of 2020. It opens with a list poem about the Union Square Greenmarket, then moves to a chapter called “Daily Cleanse” that starts with this sentence: “Mr. Harper takes sex in doorways.” Theo Harper, a white man we never like much, works in real estate. He has an open marriage to a pregnant white woman named Darla Jacobson, whose mother is living in Paris and who counsels Theo to get Darla out of the city for “breathing room and fresh air.” Darla’s best friend is Ruby Black, a Black woman who owns a restaurant in Union Square with her husband, Katsumi Fujihara. There’s also Xavier Curtis, “The Teenager in the Cardi B T-Shirt” (this and a number of other images are illustrated with small photographs), whose uncle lives in the same Park Slope building as Theo and Darla. Xavier is isolating in his uncle’s empty apartment. It’s a bit unclear where all this is going until a subordinate clause in the fourth chapter reveals that Darla, on the drive upstate to follow her mother’s advice, “turn[s] off her cell phone, which would remain off until it was found in the woods a month later.” The main plot revolves around Darla’s disappearance after a fight with Theo on a hike during which he discloses that he has a Black ancestor; he becomes the main suspect in the police investigation. At the same time, we explore the back- and side stories of the other characters, finding nuggets of practical information and advice along the way—why dull knives are more dangerous, the use of cream of tartar to remove bathtub rings, a guide to the club scene in Japan, and this advice about loss, offered by a private investigator named Yvonne Tender: “Seek out the living and find little things to love until something or someone worth loving comes along.” Meanwhile, a second mystery plot involving 9/11 surfaces. The novel eventually settles its gaze on matters of race and class, underlined by its breathtaking ending.
This restless, intentionally unsettling novel establishes Porter as a distinctive, confident literary voice.Pub Date: Aug. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9780593241868
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Hogarth
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
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
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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