Do you know the children’s book series A Series of Unfortunate Events? I love that title and it has stuck with me for decades, embedded in my brain, since I was bookseller at Borders in Minneapolis, MN, Dayton, OH and Sherman Oaks, CA. Remember Borders twenty years ago? For some reason — who knows how the brain works — I constantly think about fortuitous events and patterns in the reverse of that compilation of books – a series of FORTUNATE events. Recently Ann Patchett, her books, her writing and her speaking engagement in Cleveland, entered my orbit all at once, rather than existing on the periphery, and she and her works, have had a profound impact.

She ignited a series of very fortunate events.

My Previous Reads

I went back and searched my Goodreads for her other works I previously read including Truth & Beauty, Commonwealth, and State of Wonder. I knew I had read some of Ann’s books but if asked, probably couldn’t pull the titles or my arbitrary Goodreads star rating from memory, even if I tried. I remember getting the audiobook of The Dutch House from the Libby app sometime during the pandemic and being unable to concentrate on the story because it was narrated by Tom Hanks. In a recent read of her compilation of essays, it was fun to learn how that relationship and audio narration came about. All I could think whilst listening was, “I really like Tom Hank’s voice.” I realized I wasn’t paying attention to the story at all. I promptly returned the audiobook with the promise to pick up the hard copy or e-book at a later date.

I firmly believe books enter our orbit and find us when we need them as if they have a magical compass embedded in their pages.

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Enter Tom Lake

Ann’s recent book Tom Lake was handed to me by my beloved friend and neighbor, Donna. She knew I was a former actress, had lived in the Midwest most of my life, had probably been in or at least read the play Our Town, and would probably enjoy the novel. As we are wont to do, she left the hardcover book on my kitchen table one morning like a benevolent book fairy when she walked my beloved black lab, Oyster. Knowing absolutely nothing about the book, not understanding the title, and nothing disclosed via the beautiful cover, I hunkered down to read Tom Lake solely on Donna’s recommendation and the special transaction that happens when one lover of books passes another a book and whispers the secret password, “Read this.”

Some readers may cry out in horror, but my favorite hard cover copy of The Guernsey Literary and Potatoe Peel Pie Society has the name and date in the front cover of everyone in the last 20+ years who I have lent the book to read. The funny thing is, there are several individuals who I have no memory or recollection of who they are! I almost brought the book with me on my recent sojourn to Guernsey but opted for the kindle instead.

But I digress, back to Tom Lake. It was a slow entry for me, and at times, rather than the characters’ lives, I was pulled into a land of nostalgic reverie independent of the novel. What was my first entry into theatre and performance? Did I remember the play Our Town? I was able to swiftly pull up the jealousy of being a young actor and how it seemingly clicks for some with little effort, juxtaposed with the experience of others who have to grind and work and slave for their craft. As the novel progressed and I realized the back and forth of time, jumping from a mother sharing her life as an actress with her three daughters on their cherry orchard in Michigan to the narrative of her young life, even more sense memory was evoked. I am the youngest of four daughters, grew up in Wisconsin, was never a farmer, but knew people and friends who were. This narrative, these characters, the situations, felt familiar, they were known to me.

There are books that are fun to read, easy to read, escapism. Then there are books that showcase the brilliance of the writer, the mastery that is writing. Tom Lake was a master class in writing for me. Ann (can I call her Ann?) has the ability to write in one sentence what would take me paragraphs to work out. She seamlessly within pages jumps back and forth in time. She managed to create a narrative that took place during the pandemic and COVID lock down but wasn’t centered around the pandemic.

A Problematic Scene

There is one scene towards the end of the book that absolutely made my blood boil. I may have even shouted out loud “No, absolutely not!” Donna stopped by one morning and I verbally accosted her as she entered my house to walk Oyster. We had to discuss the one scene immediately, my poor pup had to patiently wait. I had to know her opinion. Amazingly she had no emotional response to that particular scene. We could not have differed more, representing two ends of the spectrum. We realized we needed a third opinion to weight in and break our tie.

I passed the book to my bestie and fellow bibliophile, Maggie. Readers will remember her as the person by my side through chemotherapy, transplant, and recovery. Maggie needed to put down the other 286 books she was reading or listening to and start Tom Lake. We set a date for a morning discussion with tea and pastries.

Impromptu Book Club

Last Sunday on a rainy cold day in Cleveland, we met to discuss. We dove straight into the problematic scene (Maggie sided with me) and discussed why Maggie and I had such a visceral reaction to the scene. We both agreed that the character’s actions were hard to believe. We didn’t know a single woman in our lives who would behave that way and make that choice. I didn’t feel the scene added anything to the book and that the story would have been perfect without it. Donna countered that she knew many a woman who would have acted that way. One clarifying point: we were not opposed to the subsequent consequence and choice of the character but rather the actual physical act that happened in the first place! Yes, I’m being deliberately obtuse to not ruin anything. With a 20-year age gap between us, we went down the rabbit hole as often happens when discussing a good book, and realized our arguments were generational. We were reading the scene from totally different perspectives of feminism, relationships, sex, obligation, desire and more.

I further wondered, without that scene, what my argument or take away would have been from the book. What might I have focused on? Without the visceral reaction to that scene, would the book have been relegated to my Goodreads shelf only to be resurrected if and when I picked up the next Ann Patchett book? I’ll never know.

This is why I get excited about books, about reading, about stories, about writing.

Essays and Pull Quotes

As always, I’m reading several books at once. Donna recommended These Precious Days at the same time as Tom Lake. I found myself highlighting a passage per essay and again bringing up Ann’s books, her passages as if someone finally articulated what I was unable to. The below is a small sampling of the times I needed to highlight, to ponder, to let the words marinate. I felt like she wrote what I felt. I felt without knowing me, she explained my dilemmas, my difference, my uniqueness.

I spent so much of the last decade fighting my physical decline rather than easing into the simplicity of life, appreciating the quiet, the slowing down. I’ve spent days in the last six months mucking through the remains of my adolescence realizing those events would never happen today with cell phones, helicopter parenting and pure dumb luck.

• “There is a magnificent quiet that comes from giving up the regular order of your life.”
• “I would tell you we were idiots, but that’s only true in retrospect.”
• “Walking backwards is an excellent means of remembering how little you know.”
• “The past is made of stories that are unlikely to happen now.”

With my access to healthcare, my knowledge of hospital operations and my personal experience as someone with chronic illness, I feel my medical and health literacy is a privilege. With that privilege, I am responsible to help friends, loved ones, strangers achieve the same outcomes. I must use my access to benefit others who don’t know what’s out there, don’t know who to turn to. We aren’t perfect at Cleveland Clinic, but I’ve never heard them turn someone away and say, “We don’t know what to do!” I want to be an access point for others; provide navigation and an open door.

• “He holds a kind of medical currency, saved then spent, and when needed, he can marshal all necessary parties into immediate action…”

I’ve grappled with a life stolen from me, but now realize it’s just a life altered. I resent losing my ability to choose, but I am no longer angry at the end result. I think I lacked imagination and personal agency over some of my decisions because I didn’t realize adulthood and success could be whatever I wanted; not what society dictated.

• “The future is not one thing.”
• “For as many times as the horrible thing happens, a thousand times in every day the horrible thing passes us by.”
• “Everything hurt and nothing killed me.”
• “At every turn, happiness was her decision.”
• “Clearly, she had chosen to pursue a completely different model of adulthood.”
• “I had miscalculated the tools of adulthood when I was young, or I had miscalculated the kind of adult I would be.”
• “Death always thinks of us eventually. The trick is to find the joy in the interim and make good use of the days we have.”

Speaker Series

In late September, Ann and her friend Kevin Wilson were in Cleveland chatting it up on stage at the Writer’s Center Stage event. Multiple people told me I had to watch the conversation via the private event stream as I was unable to attend in person and they offer this lovely accessible option for those of us who need it. I added at least 20 books to my To Read list, found myself laughing and loving the stories, friendship and ease with which two book lovers chatted about books. It was a spectacular, well produced event that invited us strangers into an intimate conversation among friends.

Thank you, Ann

All of this to say, books have been my refuge, my solace. Long before I experienced bouts of paralysis and spent weeks confined to a hospital bed, I escaped into the written word. Thank you, Ann Patchett for shaping my feelings into clear ideas, for reigniting memories and nostalgic reverie, and for being an unparalleled storyteller.

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Shop Local

If you have the means, forgo Amazon and put your dollars into Ann’s independent bookstore in Nashville.

If you’re buying her books, and you absolutely should, you can even get signed copies.

Shop Parnassus Books.