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ABBEY'S BOOKSELLER PICK ----- It's the summer of 2020, and Lara and her three adult daughters, who have returned home during the pandemic, are picking cherries on the family farm in Michigan. To pass the time, the girls beg Lara to tell a story they have always known – that when she was younger, she was an actress and for one season worked in a summer theatre with a man who went on to become a very famous actor. Each of the girls have a romantic and differing vision of this time, but as Lara retells the old story, she corrects their assumptions – but is she telling the whole story even now?
This is a beautiful novel about love and family, of how children never see their parents as anything else but parents, and certainly not as people with complicated pasts and desires. It is warm and wise and wholly engrossing, and because it's Patchett, full of gorgeous imagery and quietly impressive turns of phrase and characters you believe in. Every new Patchett book that comes out, I think is better than the last, but this one – this is her best. Lindy
Ann Patchett is the author of eight novels and three works of non-fiction. Her most recent novel The Dutch House was a New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller, and longlisted for the 2020 Women's Prize. In 2002 she won the Orange Prize for Fiction with Bel Canto, a prize she has also twice been shortlisted for with The Magician’s Assistant in 1998 and State of Wonder in 2012. She is also the winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award and was named one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2012. Her work has been translated into more than thirty languages. She is the co-owner of Parnassus Books in Nashville, Tennessee, where she lives with her husband, Karl.
ABBEY'S BOOKSELLER PICK ----- It's the summer of 2020, and Lara and her three adult daughters, who have returned home during the pandemic, are picking cherries on the family farm in Michigan. To pass the time, the girls beg Lara to tell a story they have always known – that when she was younger, she was an actress and for one season worked in a summer theatre with a man who went on to become a very famous actor. Each of the girls have a romantic and differing vision of this time, but as Lara retells the old story, she corrects their assumptions – but is she telling the whole story even now?
This is a beautiful novel about love and family, of how children never see their parents as anything else but parents, and certainly not as people with complicated pasts and desires. It is warm and wise and wholly engrossing, and because it's Patchett, full of gorgeous imagery and quietly impressive turns of phrase and characters you believe in. Every new Patchett book that comes out, I think is better than the last, but this one – this is her best. Lindy
A bittersweet tale of family, heartbreak and hope ... Those who want fiction to soothe, bolster and cheer will love it * Guardian * A beautiful, stirring book that sneaks up on you and makes a deep impression ... The moment I finished it, I wanted to go back and start again * Sunday Times * Few authors can dig into the minutiae of human emotion quite like the Women’s Prize-winning author, and Tom Lake is one of her best ... Flitting between past and present, the novel spools out like a film, and ponders timeless questions about love, family and destiny * i * Thoughtful and elegiac in its descriptions of first love and motherhood ... Patchett celebrates not just the smallest events of our lives, but 'small' lives themselves * Financial Times * Patchett is always great on family dysfunction, and these scenes prickle to life * The Times * A twinned narrative of a past young love, present day nostalgia and the complex, intertwined connections between mothers and daughters ... Enchanting and bittersweet, it is another tour de force from Patchett * Harper's Bazaar * A deeply American story of love, heartbreak and wistful old age ... We’re in nostalgic summer romance territory, and Tom Lake delivers the expected emotional pay-off * Telegraph * Completely absorbing * Grazia * Elegant, gloriously immersive, beautifully imagined, funny and tender, this is an elegy to family love, even when the world is a state of crisis and uncertainty. Ann Patchett leads us with the intelligence, detail, wit and nuance of the greatest chroniclers of human nature and relationships. Nothing escapes her -- Rachel Joyce Filled with the moments I live for in a story – careful, compelling insights into human nature, the most effortless humour, and the kind of vivid descriptions that reveal exactly how something is -- Bonnie Garmus, bestselling author of LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY One of our greatest living chroniclers of love and marriage – and its resounding impacts over generations – is back this summer ... Expect wonder; Patchett always delivers * Elle * Patchett’s intricate and subtle thematic web ... enfolds the nature of storytelling, the evolving dynamics of a family, and the complex interaction between destiny and choice ... These braided strands culminate in a denouement at once deeply sad and tenderly life-affirming. Poignant and reflective, cementing Patchett’s stature as one of our finest novelists * Kirkus Reviews (starred review) * Masterly ... A love letter to both storytelling itself and the bonds that tie family and friends together, Patchett has once again worked her unique brand of magic with this gentle, tender story that glows with heart and humanity * Bookseller, Book of the Month *
