Inverno

August 1, 2023

A Los Angeles Times Book Prize--winning poet who also writes essays and children's books, Zarin turns to adult fiction about a woman waiting in a snowy Central Park, New York, for Alastair, who may or may not come. As long as he doesn't, anything could happen, and we revisit the pasts of both characters. With a 30,000-copy first printing. Prepub Alert.

Copyright 2023 Library Journal

Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 16, 2023
Poet Zarin (Orbit) offers a sly and beguiling love story doubling as a meditation on the nature of time. Caroline, a middle-aged mother of two, stands in Central Park on a snowy evening, waiting for a call on her cellphone from her old love Alastair. Interspersed with this waiting, which takes up the bulk of the present-day narrative, are scenes of Caroline at different ages: as a child, an older mother at some point in the future, and a 20-something woman falling in love with Alastair. The novel slips through time and space at a sometimes dizzying pace, exploring the avenues of memory and desire in Caroline’s mind beneath her snow-dusted fox-fur hat. The omniscient narrator occasionally zooms out to explore questions about the identity and meaning of a fictional character like Caroline, and what her story can offer to readers. Though Zarin gets off to a slow start—readers familiar with the plot of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen” or the workings of a rotary phone might be tempted to skip passages that describe such things at length—she speeds up soon enough to match the quickness of Caroline’s inner life. This is an ambiguous and often lovely exploration of the limits of love and the unlimited scope of memory and imagination. Agent: Sarah Chalfant, Wylie.

November 1, 2023
A woman is standing in the snow waiting for a phone call; that much is clear. Zarin, a poet and essayist, demonstrates little interest in conventional storytelling in her debut novel, which revolves around a couple named Caroline and Alastair and their romantic attachment of 50-plus years, returning frequently to a moment in the middle of that period when Caroline was standing in the snow waiting for him to call, but also pinging back and forth among other apparently important moments--one says "apparently" because it's hard to tell what the point is. For example, there's this: "Caroline is standing in the snow in her fur hat and fur boots waiting for Alastair to call, a few yards from where thirty years before he hacked at the frozen roots of a locust tree with his penknife, and cut his arm." And this: "Caroline is standing in the snow in her fur boots and hat. It is February. It is exactly halfway between the time she saw Alastair again, the previous November, after twenty-five years, and when she would see him for the last time, the following November." And then this: "You have left Caroline in the snow: you have left two characters, standing around! Say the rest of what happened so we can move on." Interspersed with this is a lot of other mysterious stuff: an extended retelling of H.C. Andersen's The Snow Queen, where Gerda and Kai may or may not represent Alastair and Caroline; a critical review of popular music about phone calls; a recounting of the plot of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, with special attention to the line "I'd rather skip that scene, if you don't mind." In the movie, this line is delivered by a character who's telling Butch she doesn't want him to die, but takes on another, more immediate, meaning in its half-dozen repetitions here. Somewhere are probably readers who would enjoy this book. May it find them.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

December 1, 2023

DEBUT This intriguingly complicated debut novel from poet and journalist Zarin (Orbit: Poems) follows the on-again, off-again love affair of childhood friends Caroline and Alastair as it spans four decades. During this time, each pursues a career, marriages to others, and parenthood, yet when winter arrives with its bone-chilling temperatures and obstructing snow, their thoughts return to each other. Or do they? The narrative is as occluded as the road to the home in Maine where they sometimes meet. The omniscient narrator gives the impression of being directly over Caroline's shoulder, privy to her every musing, then suddenly breaks the fourth wall with a disconcerting reference to an anonymous "you," perhaps referring to an unnamed character or possibly the audience, as if speaking during a theatrical production. All may not become clear, but as the novel rambles back and forth in time, Zarin's mesmerizing voice (could anyone else dedicate a full page to the sensuous nature of the black rotary telephone?) ensnares the imagination to the point where readers will be happy to imagine the plot that suits them best. VERDICT This highly original, exceedingly complex novel might frustrate bibliophiles who prefer a linear storyline but will thrill those who revel in intoxicating language.--Sally Bissell

Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2024
One would be foolish to try to map the plot arc of poet Zarin's first novel, which if it were contained by a shape it would be a cloud, wispy and amorphous. The opening pages are set in Central Park in winter, where we meet Caroline and Alastair. Yet Caroline, an adult, exists ten years ago, and Alastair, a boy, lives 40 years before. Zarin inventively writes about these moments side by side, as if the two are mere yards away from each other despite the decades between them, thus introducing the novel's main conceit, that time is inconsequential in powerful relationships. Caroline and Alastair, who are, in fact, the same age, are pulled together on and off by a flawed connection. Between them are other imperfect relationships, aloof children, cruel parents, and mysterious tragedies, woven through the novel's intentionally elusive time line. Zarin's point, perhaps, is that life-changing love affairs mushroom out beyond the moments spent together. Full of gorgeous descriptions, fascinating characters, and impressive allusions to fairy tales, Robert Redford movies, Girl Scouts, Blondie, and more, Inverno is intellectual, acrobatic, and fascinating.

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