The Correspondent

Read this book! My first A+ in a little while. It’s almost like a jigsaw puzzle: structured entirely in letters, so you’ll have to put a few things together. It takes place over the course of nine years, as we get to know Sybil Van Antwerp, who has written letters all her life. At first, Sybil felt like a very disagreeable character to me, and I wasn’t sure if I was going to enjoy the book. But slowly, we get to understand her more deeply: her pain, her passions, her past. She writes to her family members, but also to famous authors like Joan Didion. There is her best friend Rosalie, a friend’s son Harry, a stalker who holds an unresolved grudge, and two men who are competing for Sybil’s affections. Meanwhile, she is going blind and understands that her days of letter-writing are numbered. There are so many tiny subplots that add up to make this such a beautiful, compelling read. I wept at the end. This one wil stick with me for a very long time.