A new novel for the summer
Ann Patchett’s 10th novel, Whistler, came out this week. I read it in a day and a half. It’s a wry and very moving look at how certain relationships and events from childhood, seemingly forgotten, can burst up again decades later. (But a trauma plot (opens in new window) it is not.) The book’s title comes from a story-within-the-story about a woman whose horse, named Whistler, saves her from death in the wilderness. It’s told to the story’s protagonist, Daphne, by her stepfather, a book editor who gleaned the dramatic tale from a proposal that had landed on his desk. I was delighted to discover from this interview (opens in new window) with Patchett that the embedded narrative about Whistler the horse is in fact the plot of a novel she had tried to write. Although she ended up abandoning that book after “an awful lot of research,” she found a way to integrate it into what became Whistler. How’s that for adaptive reuse?
