Tom Lake

A Novel

By: Ann Patchett

Narrated by: Meryl Streep

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK • READ BY MERYL STREEP

“Patchett leads us to a truth that feels like life rather than literature.”—The Guardian

In this beautiful and moving novel about family, love, and growing up, Ann Patchett once again proves herself one of America’s finest writers.

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.

Totally engaging!

Ann Patchett expertly drew me in, releasing tidbits of the lives of the characters, and I was invested completely into the lives of the Nelson family. Of note, all of the other personalities were in supporting roles to this story that made me miss my grandmother and appreciate the beauty of a summer morning and the satisfaction that comes from hard productive work. No surprise that Meryl Streep was brilliant as the narrator. Beautiful book.

I in a minority

I did not care for this novel. I did not care for the way it was written past to present

Best narration I’ve ever heard

As much as Ioved the story (this was my first Ann Patchett but will not be my last!) Meryl Streep made it that much better. She is perfect in this and it is not often I prefer listening to holding the actual book in hand and going over the writing at my own leisurely pace. Will Patton’s narrations of Denis Johnson, the late Richard Ferrone’s narrations of John Sandford’s Prey series, Kimberly Farr’s readings of Alice Munro and Elizabeth Strout and Edoardo Ballerini reading Beautiful Ruins and other novels/collections by Jess Walter are the gold standards for me. This is now at the very top of that list!

Loved every minute

I may be spoiled for every other audiobook forever after Meryl Streep’s performance on this! Patchett’s gorgeously crafted story is matched perfectly to Streep’s audio. I can’t stop recommending this to friends. What a treat!

Great Narration, Story Was So-So

I loved Meryl Streep's narration, she should narrate every book from now on! It really saved the book. I am a longtime fan of Ann Patchett's work. This novel was interesting but more subtle than some of her other work and I can see why some readers might find the story boring. I was never bored but I also didn't feel that magical "a-ha" I get from some of my favorite books. Some parts of the main character's story seemed glossed over. Without giving too much away, Lara's big life decision seemed really rushed at the end, as if there was a deadline and the writer needed to wrap things up. The most interesting part of Lara's story for me was that big decision at the end, not the romance along the way. Yet it seemed like Patchett just rushed past that.