BookBrowse Reviews Tom Lake by Ann Patchett

"The thing about picking cherries is that you can look only at the tree you're on, and if you have any sense, you'll just look at the branch you have your hands in," says Lara, the narrator of Ann Patchett's Tom Lake. Lara and her husband own a cherry orchard in Michigan, and the book takes place during the harvest of the summer month, for which her three grown daughters are onsite to help. It's the middle of the pandemic, so there isn't much else to do, and they beg Lara to tell them the story of how she came to date heartthrob actor Peter Duke when she was younger.

When Lara says you can only look at the tree you're on, she's also stating one of the novel's themes. Just as some of their cherries are sweet and some are tart, so are her memories (like everyone's), and it's wisest to focus on what's in front of you. Though the characters describe problems that may befall their crop at...