Book #2 |
Book: The Correspondent | Author: Virginia Evans | |
| Source: Library loan Format: Kindle |
Pages: 291 | Duration: 01/06/26 – 01/07/26 (2 days) | |
| Rating: ★★★★★ | Genres: fiction, family, books about books, grief | ||
| 📕10-word summary: Woman finds solace in literature, connecting with people by letter. 🖌6-word review: Nonpareil narrator. Commendable characters. Laudable letters. |
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| 💭A memorable quote: “I’ve now stood before my closet on three occasions and leafed through what I own, and the only black anything I have anymore is a dress I was probably wearing in the 1990s, which dips down to the uppermost part of what used to be my cleavage, but which now resembles the skin of a raw plucked chicken.” | |||
| 🎓Some new-to-me words: dryads, lichen | |||
| Description:* Sybil Van Antwerp has throughout her life used letters to make sense of the world and her place in it. Most mornings, around half past ten, Sybil sits down to write letters—to her brother, to her best friend, to the president of the university who will not allow her to audit a class she desperately wants to take, to Joan Didion and Larry McMurtry to tell them what she thinks of their latest books, and to one person to whom she writes often yet never sends the letter. Sybil expects her world to go on as it always has — a mother, grandmother, wife, divorcee, distinguished lawyer, she has lived a very full life. But when letters from someone in her past force her to examine one of the most painful periods of her life, she realizes that the letter she has been writing over the years needs to be read and that she cannot move forward until she finds it in her heart to offer forgiveness.*From goodreads.com’s synopsis. | |||
| Thoughts: This book is all the rage right now, and I waited several months for it on my library‘s waiting list. It was at — or near — the top of many “2025 best book of the year” lists. I certainly agree with its high ratings, as I enjoyed it tremendously. I love a good epistolary novel, probably because the idea of reading other people’s mail greatly appeals to me. I loved the variety of people she wrote to, including a couple of authors (Ann Patchett to name one that I love). I also love books about books, to which I recently devoted an entire blog entry, and there were several books mentioned in this book that I’ve read including, Hamnet, The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, Bel Canto, The Dutch House, 84 Charing Cross Road, The Uncommon Reader, Cutting for Stone, Rebecca, The Remains of the Day, Demon Copperhead, Crossing to Safety, and Wuthering Heights. Also book/author-related, there were a couple of Joan Didion books mentioned, whose Notes To John I recently read. And a final relevant-to-me thing in this book was a plotline in it about DNA testing, which reminded me of my recently read book: The Lost Family: How DNA Testing is Uncovering Secrets, Reuniting Relatives, and Upending Who We Are. | |||
See the rest of the books I’ve read in 2026 and previous years: 2025 | 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019.
