Mar 15

Mar 15 Virginia Evans' "The Correspondent"

Drama, Emotional, Family, Fiction, Friendship

“The Correspondent” is a masterfully and elegantly written novel about a woman I don’t think I would enjoy knowing. Taking place when the subject is elderly and written in the form of letters sent and received by her, her personal and family history are gradually and skillfully revealed, including the events that have shaped her life, personality, and her many regrets.

The idea of writing a novel in the form of letters is not new but author Evans elevates this form through a skillful mix of wit, pathos, drama, and tragedy. Sybil, the main character, now in her 70s and situated in a comfortable Annapolis home with a view of water, controls through her letter writing what she wants others (and us readers) to know about her. That control by itself helps us learn how others—including the reader—perceive her. That includes not only the people she encounters in the course of her career but members of her own family and her few current-day friends.

There are many “life lessons” one can take from reading this book. Perhaps the simplest and most direct is to pay attention to the feelings of others and to resist the temptation, especially when one is younger, to view everything in life through the lens of one’s own ambition. And when bad things happen, don’t be afraid of reaching out to others with honest sharing. Otherwise one might end up in old age, like the main character of this book, realizing that making up for lost time cane difficult.

NOTE: While I often use ChatGPT for work (chiefly research and analysis associated with client business development) I occasionally use it in connection with my book and movie reviews. In this case I finished reading this novel this morning, wrote the review out in longhand, scanned the two pages of writing, and uploaded the.pdf file to ChatGPT with the prompt, "please convert this handwritten book review into an editable text file." The immediate response was a text file that I copied into Squarespace, where I made minor edits and uploaded a copied image of the book cover. Since do a lot of writing via longhand and a fountain pen, the ability to generate an editable text file directly from the scanned handwritten file has proven to be a big timesaver.