A brilliant and keen work about being fully alive.
A novel about a day in the life of a studious Oxford undergraduate.
Annabel rises at the crack of dawn and readies herself to write a paper about Shakespeare’s sonnets. As she reads the poems, she recalls the advice of her tutor, a medievalist, to “spend as many hours as [she] could simply sitting with the text.…Look away from the text and out the window if you have to, try and pause your mind on the one thing. Focus on the experience of you reading this text now.” Brown’s gorgeously written debut is a hypnotic meditation on being attentive—on Annabel’s attempts to wrestle meaning out of Shakespeare’s poetry on this particular day and to establish a strict routine that will elevate her mind above everything else more generally. The only problem is that Annabel is human. She glances out the window and “holy shit”—the world is shrouded in mist and she’s pulled away from the sonnets to go for a walk; she must concede to bodily functions; she needs coffee; she’s cold or hungry or distracted by the thought of Rich, an older family friend who is pursuing her. In a sneaky way, the novel makes a passionate argument for distraction: While Annabel fanatically tries to discipline herself into being uber-focused, her imagination leads her astray again and again, especially toward figures she’s invented, in particular the “SCHOLAR” and the “SEDUCER,” two men whose identities she easily slips into and whose homoerotic friendship she spins out in endless variations. Brown’s attentiveness to the suppleness of language and the poetry of everyday life makes this slim novel absolutely transporting. In the closing pages, Annabel thinks, “Today has been—” and then she doesn’t, and perhaps can’t, finish the thought.
A brilliant and keen work about being fully alive.Pub Date: June 25, 2024
ISBN: 9780374613013
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.
A young woman’s experience as a nurse in Vietnam casts a deep shadow over her life.
When we learn that the farewell party in the opening scene is for Frances “Frankie” McGrath’s older brother—“a golden boy, a wild child who could make the hardest heart soften”—who is leaving to serve in Vietnam in 1966, we feel pretty certain that poor Finley McGrath is marked for death. Still, it’s a surprise when the fateful doorbell rings less than 20 pages later. His death inspires his sister to enlist as an Army nurse, and this turn of events is just the beginning of a roller coaster of a plot that’s impressive and engrossing if at times a bit formulaic. Hannah renders the experiences of the young women who served in Vietnam in all-encompassing detail. The first half of the book, set in gore-drenched hospital wards, mildewed dorm rooms, and boozy officers’ clubs, is an exciting read, tracking the transformation of virginal, uptight Frankie into a crack surgical nurse and woman of the world. Her tensely platonic romance with a married surgeon ends when his broken, unbreathing body is airlifted out by helicopter; she throws her pent-up passion into a wild affair with a soldier who happens to be her dead brother’s best friend. In the second part of the book, after the war, Frankie seems to experience every possible bad break. A drawback of the story is that none of the secondary characters in her life are fully three-dimensional: Her dismissive, chauvinistic father and tight-lipped, pill-popping mother, her fellow nurses, and her various love interests are more plot devices than people. You’ll wish you could have gone to Vegas and placed a bet on the ending—while it’s against all the odds, you’ll see it coming from a mile away.
A dramatic, vividly detailed reconstruction of a little-known aspect of the Vietnam War.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781250178633
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
BOOK TO SCREEN
SEEN & HEARD
A wistfully nostalgic look at endings, beginnings, and loving the people who will always have your back.
Exes pretend they’re still together for the sake of their friends on their annual summer vacation.
Wyn Connor and Harriet Kilpatrick were the perfect couple—until Wyn dumped Harriet for reasons she still doesn’t fully understand. They’ve been part of the same boisterous friend group since college, and they know that their breakup will devastate the others and make things more than a little awkward. So they keep it a secret from their friends and families—in fact, Harriet barely even admits it to herself, focusing instead on her grueling hours as a surgical resident. She’s ready for a vacation at her happy place—the Maine cottage she and her friends visit every summer. But (surprise!) Wyn is there too, and he and Harriet have to share a (very romantic) room and a bed. Telling the truth about their breakup is out of the question, because the cottage is up for sale, and this is the group’s last hurrah. Determined to make sure everyone has the perfect last trip, Harriet and Wyn resolve to fake their relationship for the week. The problem with this plan, of course, is that Harriet still has major feelings for Wyn—feelings that only get stronger as they pretend to be blissfully in love. As always, Henry’s dialogue is sparkling and the banter between characters is snappy and hilarious. Wyn and Harriet’s relationship, shown both in the past and the present, feels achingly real. Their breakup, as well as their complicated relationships with their own families, adds a twinge of melancholy, as do the relatable growing pains of a group of friends whose lives are taking them in different directions.
A wistfully nostalgic look at endings, beginnings, and loving the people who will always have your back.Pub Date: April 25, 2023
ISBN: 9780593441275
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Feb. 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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