dutch house

I went to visit my mom in her new little house, and we spent a few hours catching up, playing Rummy 500 (she won) and having a small lunch. Before I left we talked a little about what we were reading. We're a reading family. I was just finishing a David Baldacci book, and she was reading something in the same genre. She asked if I'd like to look through the books to see if there was anything I wanted to read. I was going to grab one; she gave me four.

The first one I started was written by an ex-soldier about some crackerjack team of ex-special forces, run by a secretly funded government group, sent to solve problems for Uncle Sam, with plausible deniability. never heard that idea before Written by Brad somebody. Less than 50 pages in, the leader of this crackerjack team admits to blacking out in anger so badly that he just murders everyone. This is the leader of the most secret, most capable tactical team in America, that is secretly saving us all? Oh, and gay bashing too. So that, and the other book by the same Brad guy, went in recycling. the writing stunk too, so even if you like gay-bashing, secret-police murder-boys, don't bother

Any-HOO...

Why I've brought you here today is to discuss Ann Patchett's The Dutch House. After adding a few of the crime/spy type novels to my arms, Mom passed me this book saying, "I asked Dad to pick out something different for me." Mom's copy has a little gold label on the cover that indicates it was a Pulitzer Prize finalist, for 2020. I'm not sure if it was that, or some other reason my dad thought she would like it, but she seemed satisfied with it, so I took it.

Its been a little while since I skipped doing other things so I could spend some more time reading a book. This one pulled me in. The Dutch House is the story of a family, and how it grew, evolved, fractured off, and came together again, around a house. The Dutch House was their escape, their palace, their history, and for some of them it was their misery. Still others, their obsession. Now don't get me wrong, this isn't some melodramatic horror movie about a haunted house, but the ghosts that whisper through the rooms and look down from the gilded frames of the past are almost characters in this story themselves.

What The Dutch House is really about is the love--and a certain amount of resentment--that still binds this little family together through the generations. Its a treatise on the work it takes to love one another. Its a study in delft blue. The characters and their relationships are real, complex and fully formed. By the end of this book, I felt like I would have recognized many of them on the streets of New York, or in a suburb north of Philly.

Patchett's writing is crisp, refreshing, and [sparingly] sprinkled with some perfectly formed phrases. Little gems that I read through, and then a few sentences later, went back and read again. I don't think I've read anything by Ann Patchett before, but looking at the list of her books on her website, I'm pretty sure I've seen some of them on reading lists, and among the recommended at libraries and bookstores. And speaking of bookstores, Patchett has opened her own with a partner, and you can find a link to her store on her website. She's all in.

Patchett also keeps a blog, which is linked to her site, and I noticed that one of the entries is a list of questions and answers from readers of The Dutch House. party on if you want to know more

I'm going to add Ann Patchett to my list of authors to read more of. 

Read this book.