The Correspondent

by Virginia Evans

Published by Penguin

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.

Through her letters we come to know Sybil Van Antwerp: stubborn, cantankerous, reclusive, opinionated, always steadfast in her belief in the power of the written word and the value of good penmanship.

But as the clock begins to tick for Sybil, the need for a few post-scripts to the life she’s led becomes apparent. Fixing her difficult relationship with her children. Taking a final chance at romance. Atoning for an old legal case which has come back to haunt her. And finally, reckoning with a devastating loss that she has spent the last thirty years holding close to her chest.

The book has been touted as 84 Charing Cross Road meets A Man Called Ove.  It’s such a heartwarming story – funny in places, heartbreaking in others – about the life of an extraordinary woman, told through her letters.  I was SO invested in this story – it’s a bit like a puzzle that you piece together to get to know Sybil.  LOVELY!

“The Correspondent is this year’s breakout novel no one saw coming.”—The Wall Street Journal