The Seaboard Review of Books, December 22, 2025
Volume 2, Issue 57 of The Seaboard Review of Books, December 22, 2025
In this issue:
The Eclipse of a Victorian Heroine: Queen Esther by John Irving (Fiction)
Where He Left Me by Nicole Baart (Fiction)
the blades of grass are dreaming by Hollay Ghadery (Poetry, Chapbook)
David Blackwood, Myth and Legend, Ed. Alexa Greist (Non-Fiction)
Kate and the Composers by Joanne Culley and Author Interview (Fiction and Interview)
Thanks for reading this issue of The Seaboard Review of Books! The next issue will be out Monday, December 29th.
James M. Fisher, editor-in-chief
Fiction
Where He Left Me by Nicole Baart
Where He left Me combines suspense, vivid description of characters and setting, and sensitivity to human nature in a memorable story.
Non-Fiction
David Blackwood, Myth and Legend, Ed. Alexa Greist
David Blackwood: Myth and Legend is the fifth major book to be published about the work of Newfoundland printmaker David Blackwood, and it is being issued at the same time as a reprint of a previous volume, Black Ice, to mark the Art Gallery of Ontario’s collection of 300 of his prints as well as a significant archival assembly of drawings, diaries, and…
Poetry
the blades of grass are dreaming by Hollay Ghadery
Anstruther Press makes beautiful chapbooks, and Hollay Ghadery’s latest is one you’ll want to leave lying about just to look at, possibly face down and opened out to see the full, wrap-around cover artwork by Charles Ruotte. True, we’re not supposed to judge books by their covers, but it’s lovely when a chapbook gets this kind of production quality. The…
Interview
The Eclipse of a Victorian Heroine: Queen Esther by John Irving
Early in John Irving’s sixteenth novel, Queen Esther, the narrator describes teacher Thomas Winslow’s pedagogic lesson, which also applies to readers of the novel: “he could teach them to read well.” When he visits Dr. Larch’s orphanage to adopt eponymous Esther, the narrator draws attention to the doctor’s desk: “The typewriter was the centerpiece; the…
New, Old & Notable is a recurring column by Gordon Phinn in which he concisely reviews several books from the past and present.
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Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune.
Wallace is a lawyer and, if we’re being honest, a jerk. When he dies of a heart attack, and Mei reaps him at his sparsely attended funeral, he’s desperate to return to the corporate hamster wheel. He has work to do! Instead, he’s taken to the Charron’s Crossing Tea Shop, where Hugo, the owner and ferryman, promises to help him cross over. The ghosts of Nelson, Hugo’s grandfather, and Apollo, Hugo’s dog, provide no end of irritation to the newly deceased Wallace. Complicating Wallace’s journey of undead self-discovery are husks (remnants of ghosts who refuse to cross over and leave the tea shop), charlatan psychics, grieving mothers, and the most terrifying being of all, The Manager. Another lovely and loving novel from TJ Klune. (Contributed by Melanie Marttila)
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