Tom Lake

You might think the title of Anne Patchett's 9th and newest novel (2023) would refer to a man with that name, but, in fact, it refers to a summer stock theatre in Michigan that has played a pivotal role in the life of narrator/protagonist Lara Nelson, nee Kenison. I have read 4 of Patchett's books and this would probably be my favorite. (See my posts on These Precious Days and The Dutch House; I also read Bel Canto long ago.) The reviews of this work are numerous and uniformly favorable, although a few did more elegantly express than I could a sense that this family/setting/dynamics were a little too perfect. Here is a short summary from Patchett's website:

"In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew. Tom Lake is a meditation on youthful love, married love, and the lives parents have led before their children were born. Both hopeful and elegiac, it explores what it means to be happy even when the world is falling apart. As in all of her novels, Ann Patchett combines compelling narrative artistry with piercing insights into family dynamics. The result is a rich and luminous story, told with profound intelligence and emotional subtlety, that demonstrates once again why she is one of the most revered and acclaimed literary talents working today."

Here are selections from and links to additional reviews: 

Kirkus: "Patchett expertly handles her layered plot, embedding one charming revelation and one brutal (but in retrospect inevitable) betrayal into a dual narrative that deftly maintains readers’ interest in both the pastand present action. 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."

The Guardian: "Patchett’s new novel, in which a mother tells her daughters about her early romance with a famous actor, is a gentle but revealing meditation on lost love and destiny."

The New York Times: "This author is such a decorated and beloved figure in American letters — spinning out novels, memoirs and essays like so many multicolored silks; ... — that I sometimes think of her as Aunt Patchett...With 'Tom Lake,' she treats us — and perhaps herself — to a vision of a family beautifully, bucolically simple: nuclear, in its pre-bomb meaning...'Tom Lake' is a quiet and reassuring book" 

The New Yorker: "In these scenes, the source of Lara’s contentment is sweetly obvious. When Nell laments the celebrity Lara could perhaps have been, she exclaims, “Look at this! Look at the three of you! You think my life would have been better spent making commercials for lobster rolls?” The pandemic portions of the book conjure an adult world of trade-offs and compromise, in which family offers abundant recompense for lacklustre Google search results. The girls themselves are delicious creations." 

The Washington Post: "So many books about love are actually about heartbreak. Ann Patchett’s new novel, 'Tom Lake,' is not. 'Tom Lake' is about romantic love, marital love and maternal love, but also the love of animals, the love of stories, love of the land and trees and the tiny, red, cordiform object that is a cherry. Not that a heart is not broken at some point, but it breaks without affecting the remarkable warmth of the book, set in summer’s fullest bloom...Ann Patchett’s wisdom about love has run though all of her novels and nonfiction books.. As soon as you finish 'Tom Lake,' you should go back and read them all." 

Publishers Weekly: "Patchett ... unspools a masterly family drama set in the early months of Covid-19...'There's a lot you don't know,' Lara tells Emily, Maisie, and Nell at the novel's opening, and as Patchett's slow-burn narrative gathers dramatic steam, she blends past and present with dexterity and aplomb, as the daughters come to learn more of the truth about Lara's Duke stories, causing them to reshape their understanding of their mother. Patchett is at the top of her game." 

Booklist: "Lara's three twentysomething daughters are back home in northern Michigan, thanks to the COVID-19 lockdown, just in time to harvest the cherries. Emily has already committed herself to the family orchard and farm and her other great love, neighbor Benny. Maisie discovers that she can continue her veterinarian studies by caring for their neighbors' animals. Only Nell, an aspiring actor, is distraught because of their isolation, but all are ravenous for distraction as they work long hours handpicking cherries, so they insist that their mother tell them, in lavish detail, the story of her romance with a future megawatt movie star. Lara strategically fashions an edited version for her daughters, while sharing the full, heartbreaking tale with the reader. "