A sometimes cryptic, often moving meditation on life, death, and eternity.
A monk dictates enigmatic writings that speak of a looping cycle of rebirth in High’s fable-like novel.
In an island monastery in a nameless land, a one-eyed monk known as the Temple Sweeper tells another monk, called Enduring Sound, about his past in fragmented soliloquies, stories and poems. They coalesce into a narrative about a war fought during the Temple Sweeper’s boyhood in which his family is massacred; the conflict escalates into a campaign to exterminate orphans, known as the Lost Children. The future Temple Sweeper roams the war-torn landscape encountering mythic personalities, including a mute girl who keeps a diary and helps him rescue an infant boy; the shaman Hempis, who can fly and manipulate others’ dreams; and a circus and theater group run by the Ghostwoman, who ferries him and the infant boy to the monastery. Along the way the Temple Sweeper kills soldiers—and cuts off some of his fingers in penance—and becomes a Dream Master capable of assassinating people in their sleep. In later sections of the novel, the aged Temple Sweeper becomes a ghost while still communing with Enduring Sound; new characters arrive with cosmic ties to old ones. The author, a poet and Zen monk, touches on violent and supernatural elements, but the book is less an adventure yarn than a fairy-tale philosophical reflection on Buddhist themes of compassion, forgiveness, reincarnation, and the oneness of being and non-being (“If things arise and fall away at the same time, they don’t actually exist, the jade-shadowed crow observes— / And if they don’t actually exist, how can they cease to exist? the amber crow caws back”). These pensées can be heavy going, but the vivid lyricism of High’s writing (Enduring Sound describes the Temple Sweeper “shivering like a hungry ghost with only the dimmed widow-light of the sky revealing his torn face and shuttered eye”) makes for an engrossing read. Photos of the author’s colorful, swirling ensō paintings provide a captivating visual accompaniment to the text.
A sometimes cryptic, often moving meditation on life, death, and eternity.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2023
ISBN: 9798985620641
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Wet Cement Press
Review Posted Online: July 31, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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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