Captivating Characters of May link-up opportunity! Please join the link party or share your most captivating character in the comments.

Carol’s Captivating Characters of May Link-Up

On the last Friday of the month, I will write a post about my most captivating character of the month and create a Link Party (see link below my review)! In addition to hearing about the memorable characters that have captivated you, I also want this new project to facilitate new bookish friendships, help you find your book twin, and promote blog engagement. This link party will stay active for 30 days. In exchange for linking your post back to me, I promise to visit every blog post that links up, leave a comment, and share your post once on #bookx or #booksky.

Captivating Character Link Up Details:

1. You can use fictional or real characters/persons.
2. Link up a review that specifically highlights a captivating character or person, or write a post dedicated to your most captivating character or person of the month.
3. Please include a link back to my monthly post.
4. Be kind: visit one other post in the link-up and leave a comment.
5. #CaptivatingCharacters25

No blog? No problem! Share your most captivating character of the month in the comments.

Thanks for participating Joanne @ Portobello Book Blog (check out her love for Gerard!)

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Sybil

Name of Captivating Character: Sybil
The reason she is captivating: unique, opinionated, smart, feisty, thoughtful, caring, vulnerable
Book and Author: The Correspondent by Virginia Evans (debut); FREE Book Club Kit
Genre/Categories/Setting: Contemporary Fiction, Literary Fiction, Epistolary, Maryland
Mood: Reflective

Sybil Van Antwerp is retired from a brilliant career in law and has always considered herself a correspondent. She uses letter writing as a form of self-expression and a way to make sense of the world. She enjoys her daily letter-writing routine where she writes to her brother, her best friend, the troubled child of a colleague, authors of books she reads, her neighbor, other assorted individuals that come into her life, and to one unnamed person. Through this varied and often forthright correspondence, we become acquainted with Sybil and her opinions, feisty personality, deepest regrets, and the sources of her grief and regrets.

Sybil is unique and relatable, thoughtful and caring, honest, and grieving. In her 70s, she’s reflecting on her career, her deep loss, and a few regrets. She’s also a woman of action. Through her letter writing, we know that she is a faithful friend and offers support to many people. She’s as likely to write to a stranger as an acquaintance.

Through Sybil’s correspondence, we glimpse her grief, strengths, weaknesses, regrets, and shortcomings. She is relatable and feels a burden to set some things right. From this character study, we gain an appreciation of her strong personality and begin to understand her failures. Making personal connections is one reason we love certain characters and stories. I found a great deal to relate to in Sybil’s story. I certainly felt strongly motivated to write a letter to someone (anyone!) after turning the last page.

After devoting herself to her career, living as a divorced woman for decades, and facing blindness, Sybil does entertain the idea of a new relationship in the winter of her life. We cheer her on and wish her all the happiness.

I’m eager for you to meet Sybil! Be prepared for her to ask, “What are you reading?”

Spoiler: You might be interested to know that at the moment, this book is #1 on my favorite reads of the year list!

Star Rating: 5 Stars

My Full Review Here

FREE Book Club Kit here

Meet the Author of The Correspondent, Virginia Evans

Virginia Evans is from the east coast of the United States. She attended James Madison University for her bachelor’s in English literature. After starting a family, she went back to school for her master’s of philosophy in creative writing at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, where she had the good fortune to study under Carlo Gébler, Eoin McNamee, Claire Keegan, Harry Clifton and Kevin Power. She now lives in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, with her husband, Mark, two children, Jack and Mae, and her Red Labrador, Brigid.

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You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

(this link party is open for 30 days)

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“Ah, how good it is to be among people who are reading.”
~Rainer Maria Rilke
“I love the world of words where life and literature connect.”
~Denise J Hughes
“Reading good books ruins you for reading bad ones.”
~Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
“I read because books are a form of transportation, teaching, and connection. Books take us to places we’ve never been, teach us about our world, and help us understand human experience.”
~Madeleine Riley

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