We gathered on Marion’s lovely patio to discuss “Tom Lake” by Ann Patchett. Set in the spring of 2020, the Covid-19 lockdown provides the circumstances that have Lara and her three young adult daughters picking cherries in their orchard in northern Michigan because most of their picking crews have not been able to come. When Lara was young, she had a romance with a man who became a famous movie star and her girls want to hear everything about this relationship. As Lara recounts the story, she learns more about herself and her choices and realizes that “the number of things I’d failed to grasp back then was as limitless as the stars in the night sky.” The book is a “compilation of small moments,” with Lara thinking she shouldn’t be so content at this time of lockdown, but she has her daughters, husband and farm as a consequence of choices she made in her youth.
submitted by Leslie Horsman
