The Correspondent by Virginia EvansMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
I did not expect to enjoy this book as much as I did, given that wholly epistolary narratives often bore me. I can see why some people don't love it, but anyone who outright dislikes it might lack a soul (I said what I said). It is a deeply human narrative, cast in the voice (mostly of) Sybil Van Antwerp, a septuagenarian former legal clerk, who writes letters (and the occasional email) unabashedly to everyone from Joan Didion (who responds!), her neighbor Mr. Lübeck, the customer service agent at a DNA genetics site, her lifelong best friend, and more. Sybil has secrets, but not of the Frieda McFadden variety...more of the deeply tragic variety that many more of us carry than we likely know. What makes the book so striking for me is how unsensationalized it is--Sybil runs against the grain in several ways, but she's ultimately very human and relatable. Certainly one might empathize with her innate need for connection, which she expresses (at times stubbornly) through her devotion to letter writing.
There is a semi-predictable (and not really hidden) sub-narrative, and if anything, I found that to be a distraction from amazing exchanges (particularly with Basam and Henry). Some threads get tied up in a nice bow, but some don't, and that's exactly as it should be. When Sybil does finally reveal her secret, for me it was about to WHOM and HOW she revealed it that was the most touching. But again, by the time we got there, I was really much too invested in all the connections she had in various ways to feel too stunned/upset. I guess I felt upset for her and it does help explain a lot.
The end did not make me cry, but the middle did -- on several occasions. And that's a book I love. And it made me want to write a few letters of my own.
View all my reviews
Challenges on Storygraph (@rebcamuse):
2026 Reading Goals 12/60
Tackle your Physical TBR 2026: no. 8
#192030 Challenge: 2025
No comments:
Post a Comment