In 12-step parlance, “doing a geographical” refers to the concept of undertaking a physical relocation in order to avoid the hard and necessary work of emotional healing. At the beginning of bestselling author Kim van Alkemade’s fourth novel, Upstate, adjunct professor and memoirist Audrey Beacon appears to be doing just that. After the unexpected death of her husband, David, at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Audrey is desperate to get out of New York City, and impulsively empties her bank account to purchase a house in the small upstate town of Schuywich. There’s an additional hitch: A covenant attached to the sale requires her to reopen a bookstore that had once been located in the property’s barn.
With zero bookselling background—in fact, zero business experience of any kind—Audrey jumps in the deep end during the worst retail environment in decades, only to find that her life is paralleling the path of the bookstore’s founder, Evelyn Cabot. Evelyn also fled the city, albeit for love rather than money. In 1956, the women’s magazine columnist didn’t dare disclose to her readers that the “roommate” she mentioned in her articles was in fact town librarian Hazel McIntyre, who was her lover and partner. After discovering a hidden cache of love letters from Hazel to Evelyn, Audrey begins to piece together a picture that has ramifications for Schuywich’s current residents and for her own life as well.
Perhaps not since Pat Conroy has an author been able to drop the reader into a milieu—both topological and emotional—with such vivid and gorgeous prose. Speaking of Central Park, Alkemade notes that “Olmsted’s illusion of nature is shattered by downtown skyscrapers that serrate the horizon.” She describes David’s eyes as being “blue as a mythical lake where magic swords are hidden,” and when Audrey’s house is cabled up, the new homeowner observes that “a dome of wi-fi now arches over me like Glinda’s magic bubble.” Phrases like these make Upstate feel like a bottomless bonbonniere. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself lingering over, and revisiting, the luscious turns of phrase in this enchanting slice of fiction.