Bel Canto

Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award • Winner of the Orange Prize • National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist • New York Times Readers’ Pick: Top 100 Books of the 21st Century

"Bel Canto is its own universe. A marvel of a book." —Washington Post Book World

Ann Patchett’s spellbinding novel about love and opera, and the unifying ways people learn to communicate across cultural barriers in times of crisis. 

Somewhere in South America, at the home of the country's vice president, a lavish birthday party is being held in honor of the powerful businessman Mr. Hosokawa. Roxanne Coss, opera's most revered soprano, has mesmerized the international guests with her singing. It is a perfect evening—until a band of gun-wielding terrorists takes the entire party hostage. But what begins as a panicked, life-threatening scenario slowly evolves into something quite different, a moment of great beauty, as terrorists and hostages forge unexpected bonds and people from different continents become compatriots, intimate friends, and lovers.

Patchett's lyrical prose and lucid imagination make Bel Canto a captivating story of strength and frailty, love and imprisonment, and an inspiring tale of transcendent romance.

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Published Aug 2, 2005

318 pages

Average rating: 7.36

431 RATINGS

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Community Reviews

What Bookclubbers are saying about this book

✨ Summarized by Bookclubs AI

Readers say *Bel Canto* by Ann Patchett is a captivating, seamless, and emotionally rich novel blending opera, hostage drama, and unexpected friendshi...

Sue Dix
Mar 14, 2026
10/10 stars
This is a delightfully tragic book, whose ending was at once expected and unexpected. I have read other books by Ann Patchett, but Bel Canto has become my favorite.
boyleschris
Dec 15, 2024
Lesa's current read; likes this author
Casey O
Apr 20, 2026
10/10 stars
holy shit.
Wannabwestern
Jan 14, 2026
8/10 stars
I was kicked out of my book club for recommending this book about Stockholm syndrome. It has a racy chapter but it is written in a dreamlike manner that few authors could have believably pulled off. This is a gorgeous piece of literature.
Aravind Anilkumar
Dec 10, 2025
10/10 stars
This is indeed one of the very best books i have read this year, it is seamless and flowing and it captivates and enthralls.

Slowly as the hilarity of the hostage taking and its fallout ensues, we ourself are held captive in the exemplary Bel Canto by Ann pratchet.

It is easily an easy to read book, a page turner that can force you to finish it in a single sitting.

As with any good book, you fall in love with the characters, you stand for them, you weep with them and feel their hearts beats as they fall helplessly in love.

One should definitely read this and possibly like me you will be forced to read other books by Ann, albeit they may be better still.

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