Ann Patchett’s Tom Lake is a stunning read that earns all 5 stars. Set during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, the novel follows Lara Nelson and her daughters—Emily, Maisie, and Nell—as they quarantine at their family orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, Lara recounts her time as a young actress in New Hampshire, focusing on her romance with Peter Duke, who later became a famous actor. The daughters are eager for details about Lara’s past, and each responds differently to her revelations and then reflects on her own life. Through these stories, Patchett explores themes of love, memory, and the choices that shape our lives. Her writing […]
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Hello Beautiful
Ann Napolitano, the brilliant writer behind Dear Edward (2020), has done it again with her latest novel, Hello Beautiful. While I normally steer clear of Oprah’s Book Club picks, Ann Napolitano is phenomenal, so I gave it a go. We meet William Waters as a young boy in a house silenced by tragedy. His parents can hardly look at him, so it’s a relief when he earns a scholarship to college far away from his childhood home. He soon meets Julia Padavano, an ambitious young woman. He is soon engulfed in her boisterous close-knit Italian family, and embraced by sisters Sylvie, a romantic bibliophile, Cecelia, an aspiring artist, and Emeline, […]
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