A bristling, lurching, and often insightful investigation of the past.
Wright’s experimental novel meditates on history and racism in the Deep South.
Welcome to Louisiana. This “Sportsman’s Paradise,” as the state motto has it, is a land with a complicated past, from its slave trade to the Battle of New Orleans during the War of 1812 to its showcasing, and later removal, of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee. This fictional journey begins around 2016 in Baton Rouge, the state capital, named after a “red stick” that was once used to demarcate a border. It’s home to a section called Standard Heights, a neighborhood that was once “a company town built for workers by Standard Oil at the turn of the last century.” Many streets in the neighborhood are named after Native American nations—which is odd, given past violence against them by white settlers. Its proximity to what is now a large ExxonMobil plant makes it less-than-prime real estate. It’s also a place that was once home to a man named Toussaint; the pollution was so bad when he was growing up there that his father wouldn’t allow the opening of any windows in the family home. As the narrator, a writer on an unusual quest, converses with Toussaint, the story becomes a personalized tour of Southern injustice. Items for discussion include everything from The Negro Motorist Green Book and lynching postcards to the 2017 Floyd Mayweather-Connor McGregor boxing match. The narrator eventually makes it to New Orleans in time to see the removal of the Lee statue; he reveals that he, himself, is a distant relative to an infamous historical figure. A photo of that man is included, among other images, such as of a crumbling interior of the abandoned Charity Hospital in New Orleans. It all amounts to a collage-like look at America’s troubling past.
Wright’s novel progresses in a concentrated but rather plotless manner in long, dense sentences. The ExxonMobil site in Baton Rouge is described as “a city-state unto itself with its own body of rules and oral traditions maintained by an order of petrochemical priests.” Toussaint speaks of how he “summoned the catawampus courage to overcome the trepidation and the taboo, which had gripped me for years” against opening windows at home. The work abounds with such slow, poetic lines, and their tone works best when guiding readers through lesser-known aspects of the past. For instance, a floodgate system called the Spillway is described, intriguingly enough, as only having been opened 11 times. Yet the work’s unrelenting earnestness can make for some jarring moments that may take readers out of the story, as when Toussaint’s father is said to have taken him to watch the Spillway opening one spring so that he would “fear death by water,” and the aforementioned boxing match is sold as a racial conflict with “white frat-bro types and their blonde ratchets, pumping fists and cheering for McGregor to whipsaw Mayweather.” That said, although the work’s examination of history is unsubtle, readers will be left with more than a few uncomfortable emotions to mull over.
A bristling, lurching, and often insightful investigation of the past.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 9781604893434
Page Count: 345
Publisher: Livingston Press
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.
A love story about a life of second chances.
In Nassau, in the Bahamas, casino detective Vincent LaPorta grills Alfie Logan, who’d come up a winner three times in a row at the roulette table and walked away with $2 million. “How did you do it?” asks the detective. Alfie calmly denies cheating. You wired all the money to a Gianna Rule, LaPorta says. Why? To explain, Alfie produces a composition book with the words “For the Boss, to Be Read Upon My Death” written on the cover. Read this for answers, Alfie suggests, calling it a love story. His mother had passed along to him a strange trait: He can say “Twice!” and go back to a specific time and place to have a do-over. But it only works once for any particular moment, and then he must live with the new consequences. He can only do this for himself and can’t prevent anyone from dying. Alfie regularly uses his power—failing to impress a girl the first time, he finds out more about her, goes back in time, and presto! She likes him. The premise is of course not credible—LaPorta doesn’t buy it either—but it’s intriguing. Most people would probably love to go back and unsay something. The story’s focus is on Alfie’s love for Gianna and whether it’s requited, unrequited, or both. In any case, he’s obsessed with her. He’s a good man, though, an intelligent person with ordinary human failings and a solid moral compass. Albom writes in a warm, easy style that transports the reader to a world of second chances and what-ifs, where spirituality lies close to the surface but never intrudes on the story. Though a cynic will call it sappy, anyone who is sick to their core from the daily news will enjoy this escape from reality.
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780062406682
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
