Book Review: The Correspondent

INTRODUCTION

            With three declining grandparents, I tend not to read books with elderly main characters (hence why I don’t touch A Man Called Ove). It’s too close to home for me to enjoy the reading experience. My grandparents are everything to me and reading a book about elderly people going through loneliness, grief, and family drama scared me.

            When presented with The Correspondent, I accepted the challenge. As expected, I was left crying with that empty/full feeling in the pit of my stomach. The main character, Sybil, is just typical enough to be anyone’s grandmother while being unique enough to stand on her own. Whatever you do, don’t imagine your grandmother as Sybil.

 

OVERVIEW (from publisher’s website)

            Sybil Van Antwerp is a mother and grandmother, divorced, retired from a distinguished career in law, an avid gardener, and a writer of letters. 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. 

Because at seventy-three, Sybil has used her letters to make sense of the world and her place in it. But as Sybil expects her life to go on as it always has, letters from someone in her past force her to examine one of the most painful periods of her life.

THOUGHTS

            I gave The Correspondent a 4/5 stars. The whole time I read it, I felt like I was watching the Autumn leaves turn from green to orange as I enjoyed a bowl of soup and warm blanket. It was by far one of the coziest reads I’ve had this year. Every morning, I spent an hour on the couch with my dog, Coal, reading. It was the perfect way to start my days.  

            The novel is told through letters which made perfect sense for the story. The main character archives her life through letters and emails so it’s only natural her story would be told that way too. Going into it, I was a bit worried about the epistolary nature, worried I wouldn’t get the full picture. Evans qualmed those fears right away. Our main character, Sybil, writes letters to anyone and everyone. Even though Sybil shares everything with her correspondents, it never felt expository. I believed this was a woman who had a lot to say.

            My favorite part of the book was the subplot with Harry. Harry is a young boy who was assigned Sybil as a pen pal but has kept up correspondence long after. Sybil writes to Harry as he enters new schools, deals with shaky parents, and troubling mental health. It was a touching part of the story that alone kept me turning the page.

            Evans explores great themes like grief, decline, loneliness, family drama, and identity. Early on, it’s established that Sybil is going blind and, someday, won’t be able to send letters anymore. As the story goes on, we watch as she comes to terms with her declining vision and it broke my heart seeing it unfold. Each theme is handled with grace. It felt like each one had something new to say, making me consider these themes in a new light.

            The ending punched me in the heart. I have three declining grandparents as I write this, and the ending was as abrupt as life itself. I don’t want to spoil the ending, but based on the premise of the novel, it’s not hard to guess. The obviousness of the ending didn’t make it any less sad. I cried through my Intro to Spanish class.

            I took a star off because, as readers of my reviews know, I had a hard time keeping the characters straight. Sybil has quite the wide circle. About a third of the way into the book, I got frustrated that I couldn’t remember who her sibling was as opposed to her best friend. Lots of names are thrown into the letters with not enough context to keep them organized.

            The Correspondent would be perfect for book clubs. While it provides great discussion points for the book itself, the content has the ability to foster conversations outside the confines of the story.

 

Lorraine Durbin ’26 is a creative writing major at Susquehanna University with a specialization in creative non-fiction