Angela M is taking a break.'s Reviews > Tom Lake

You might say this is Lara’s story of one summer in her early twenties when she played summer stock and was in love with an actor who later becomes a famous movie star. You might say it’s her three daughters’ stories who are home to help pick cherries on the family farm, since the workers can’t come during the pandemic. It’s not, though a story about the pandemic, for which I was thankful. It’s a story of family, of relationships, a story of the past and present and perhaps where the future will take these young women . About the future, perhaps because Lara’s story is really about realizing the only life she ever really wanted and that’s the story she tells them. The daughters beg Lara to tell them about that summer and they hang on her every word telling of the actor and then how Lara later fell in love with their father, who by the way stole my heart . I also hung on her every word and every word that Patchett wrote. I very much appreciated that the reader becomes privy to a few parts of the story that she doesn’t tell her daughters choosing to keep some things to herself and of course the reader . The writing is flawless , moving seamlessly back and forth between past and present even within chapters .

To say that I was excited that Ann Patchett had a new novel is an understatement. To say that I was thrilled to be fortunate to get an advanced copy of it is a huge understatement. I fell in love with her writing from the first book of hers that I read, Bel Canto. Since then I’ve read all of her novels and a book of her essays These Precious Days: Essays. She’s a versatile writer and I’m never disappointed no matter what the novel is about because she just has such a talent for creating relatable characters and relationships. This novel is just one more reason why I’ll read anything she writes. I loved everything about it.

I received a copy of this book from HarperCollins through Edelweiss.