Dr. Radway’s Sarsaparilla Resolvent

Image of a man with a bottle of Sarsaparilla in his pocket

Beth Kephart

2013

New City Community

 
“The bare bones of Beth Kephart’s new story sound modern, but this bright, burning novel — intended for a young adult audience but powerful enough to engage any adult — is set in the Philadelphia of 1870. Using surprising period details and a gorgeous turn of phrase, Kephart has called forth an interesting time in our city’s history and made it live again for just a moment.” — Katie Haegele, Philadelphia Inquirer 
 
“One of Kephart’s gifts in her ongoing written exploration of Philadelphia is the capacity, and the willingness, to look on all that’s here with honesty, to allow for confusion and contradiction, for might and violence all at once. A writer does so by loving her characters, even the rotten ones, even the city so sour it might burn. And by bathing it, as only this one can, in fullness of breath.” — Nathaniel Popkin, Philly.com
 
“As fourteen-year-old William goes in search of what has been taken from his family and as he thinks about what he is missing (including a murdered brother and a father in prison), we see that a great deal of what is loved can be recovered. William internalizes his brother Francis’ voice and can imagine what Francis would say to him at an important moment. Dr. Radway’s Sarsaparilla Resolvent shines as a novel about grief itself, suggesting that in thinking about what we miss, we keep what’s missing alive.” — Michelle Fost, Cleaver Magazine