Well written, gentle story of a mother and her daughters and the mother telling the girls about when she was young like them.

It was too sweet and sappy to be believable. Felt like a Hallmark channel or Lifetime movie.

E

Loved it!

Meh

Tom Lake, Ann Patchett, author; Meryl Streep, narrator
At first, one might think that this is a simple story because of the easy, relaxed writing style of the author. The reader will feel she is talking to you, as well as her daughters, as she reveals her memories to them. It would be a mistake, however, because although it is easy to read, the messages in this novel are deeper than it seems on the surface. It is not just a story about Lara’s famous past, it is about how her past altered her future, about how the girls reacted to her history and her experiences. It is an examination of how our hopes and dreams, joys and tragedies, life and death determine our trajectory and how our appreciation or lack of appreciation of our experiences colors our lives. It is about human frailty and human strength. It is about how our ambition directs us toward success or failure. It is about weakness and selfishness, as well as strength and compassion. It is about choices and about true love and unrequited love. It is about relationships between partners, siblings, parents and children, friends, workers, and lifestyles and only just barely, about racial tension.
Lara Kenison and Joe Nelson have three daughters, Nell is the eldest, her name is significant; Maisie is the middle child, her name is significant, and Emily is the youngest, her name, also, is significant. Two years separate the birth of each daughter. The cherry farm is an important character in this novel, too, just as the play Our Town and Lara’s grandmother are, as well.
Because of the pandemic, all three girls have gone home to help their parents on their cherry farm. As the family begins to harvest the cherries, the girls demand answers from their mother. They want to know about her once romantic relationship with the famous actor Peter Duke. They are all obsessed with the need to know. Lara acquiesces and begins to speak. While still in high school, she was given the opportunity of a lifetime. She auditions for the part of Emily in the production of Our Town and gets it. Then, later on, she is offered the opportunity for a screen test, and she changes her name for Laura to Lara, when she fills out the paperwork. She travels, by herself, for the test, and she gets a significant role in a movie going into production. The movie, however, was plagued with delays, and she is getting nowhere. She is advised to go to Tom Lake to try out to be Emily, once again, in the stage production of Our Town. This will keep her in the profession and help her to gain recognition. If she gets the part of Emily Webb, she will play opposite Peter Duke, an up and leading man. Their relationship is really what her daughters want to know about. They are so impressed by the fact that she acted with him. She will tell them her story, and the story of her relationship with their father, Joe Nelson, who was the stage manager for the show. It was cursory at first and did not bloom until years later. She will explain why she quit acting after an injury that sapped her confidence as she realized she was not invulnerable. She will tell them about the many different personalities that influenced her life, like her grandmother, Sebastian and Peter Duke, Ripley, the movie director, the Nelsons who once owned the Michigan cherry farm where she now lives and works with her family, Pallace, her understudy, of a different race, and of others. She reveals how they either enriched her life or altered it. She teaches them about true love and respect as her tale unfolds.
As she reveals her life, the book examines different kinds of relationships in depth, although the reader absorbs these revelations almost without realizing it. There are scenes of expressing deep love, deep ambition, and deep betrayals. There are moments of redemption, tragedy, and compassion. There are examples of duplicity, shallowness, and unrequited love. There is the ever-present atmosphere of selfishness, egotism, and ambition. Lara goes through her life, almost into her sixth decade, seemingly effortlessly. Even when her life seems to spin out of control, she lands on her feet and moves on. She is understanding and supportive as a parent. She loves her husband, her family, her farm and her life. She has allowed her experiences, good and bad, to enrich her life, not to destroy it, even when circumstances were beyond her control.
This is a good story, easy to read, but sometimes the reader will feel they have to suspend disbelief, as the story veers a bit off into the realm of not quite plausible. It is therefore, sometimes, a bit slow. Lara represents the past. She loves being a wife and mother. Her daughters represent the future, and they are not too sure that they want the same life. Their dreams are different, and so are the times. The story sometimes makes you suspend disbelief.
The narrator, a famous actress, is good, but not as expressive as I thought she would be. Sometimes, because of the prose, the narration felt flat and at other times the character's voice seemed forced or unrealistic. Overall, however, the story is a pleasant and what I would call a peaceful read.

A winding story of a life well lived told. Beautiful imagery. Surprising moments.
Good characters.

We were divided in our book club. You either loved it or did not. I found the main character easily influenced and trying to justify her decision to leave acting (or convince herself she made the correct choices). I thought at the beginning of the book that her daughters were elementary or middle school aged (not adults). A story that went no where. A long, long, story about one topic that had no depth. Take this book to the beach.

Loved this book. Read it and then listened to the beautiful audio version read by Meryl Streep. One note to book clubs... Our bookclub reviews were mixed, but when I asked how many had seen or read the play Our Town prior to reading Tom Lake, not many had. I think if you are thinking of reading this, and you have not experienced Thorton Wilders beautiful and poignant play, Our Town, please do yourself a favor and see the play before you read Tom Lake. It so happens that Jim Parsons will be playing the part of the Stage Manager in a new Broadway production of Our Town this fall. Find a way to see Our Town. It’s a wonderful play and will make the reading and understanding of Tom Lake, so much more meaningful.