The Dutch House: A Read with Jenna Pick

This book was incredible. I did listen to the audiobook version that was narrated by Tom Hanks, but I still think reading it would’ve been just as impactful. It’s so rich, and I love how the author is so descriptive in her language.

Having grown up outside of Philadelphia, I found the setting of The Dutch House well written and very familiar.

Loved this book; narration by Tom Hanks is superb.

We had a great discussion of The Dutch House by Ann Patchett. It was such a wonderful and thoughtful exploration of a book that received some mixed reviews from the group. A few found it slow and perhaps a bit frustrating in the way the author resolved, or didn’t resolve, some of the characters or their issues. Others loved it. Some loved the audio reading (Tom Hanks narrating), some thought that it might have been better without him. All of those differing reactions led to a very interesting discussion! I really loved the book, and that audio, and I also could really see the perspective of the folks who had a different experience with it. One of the things that we all tended to agree on was that the author was able to craft some nuanced characters (some remained more “generic”) and explore some of the complex emotions wrapped up in parent-child and sibling-sibling relationships. The other things that we all agreed on it that it is a pretty hard sell to a group of moms to make a mom who abandons her kids as a sympathetic or understandable character! I wish that I had the book in front of me so that I could capture some of Ann Patchett's writing. And I equally wish I had the audiobook playing so that I could hear Tom Hanks reading to me some more. We had a great time discussing The Dutch House on Monday, even with a few folks not quite to the end (sorry for the spoilers). We reflected, more than once, how it was interesting that Ann Patchett had created a book that we all enjoyed so much where not much happened. Sure, people grew older and passed in and out of each other's lives, but it was a "quiet" sort of book there well drawn characters lived emotionally nuanced lives and even the "villain", Andrea, was the recipient of kindness that we don't quite know if she deserved. One thing that we all really enjoyed is that the main characters did not seem "weighed down" or "turned dark" by the hardships in their lives. There was enough love in their relationships and enough support from one another than they each seemed to be able to make a life for themselves that was more happiness than sorrow. And part of that was a deliberate choice. As Maeve explains to Danny when their mother returns ... "“There is a finite amount of time,” Maeve said. “Maybe I understand that better now. I’ve wanted my mother back since I was ten years old, and now she’s here. I can use the time I’ve got to be furious, or I can feel like the luckiest person in the world.” She makes the choice to use the time to have relationship rather than hatred. Even Maeve and Danny's pilgrimages to the Dutch House were not steeped in bile or bitterness, but seemed almost a reverent happenstance ... it was just where they met to pass the time. Patchett also explored a character that we see pop up again and again in books ... the less than perfect mother. In this instance, it was the mom who felt that helping others was perhaps more important than being there for her children. Maeve talks about the double standard ... "“Men!” Maeve said, nearly shouting. “Men leave their children all the time and the world celebrates them for it. The Buddha left and Odysseus left and no one gave a shit about their sons. They set out on their noble journeys to do whatever the hell they wanted to do and thousands of years later we’re still singing about it. Our mother left and she came back and we’re fine. We didn’t like it but we survived it." As an author, she seems to want to grant forgiveness to her .. or at least some understanding (Sandy and Jocelyn love her, Maeve forgivers her) .. but as a reader I had a hard time with it. But the book as a whole, no hard time at all!

“But we overlay the present onto the past. We look back through the lens of what we know now, so we’re not seeing it as the people we were, we’re seeing it as the people we are, and that means the past has been radically altered.” With the house they spent their early years in as the backdrop, Danny tells the story of himself and his sister Maeve, particularly following their mother's abandoment of them as children and their stepmother's immediate eviction of them from the house upon their father's death. Danny and Maeve find themselves only able to rely on each other. Spanning a period of many decades, the house comes in and out of view as they try to move on with their lives. What a stunning portrait of the relatioship between siblings. And this is no ordinary sibling relationship. Maeve's quiet anger at both parents for failing them is rivaled only by her fierce protectiveness of her younger brother. Equally fierce is Danny's loyalty to his big sister. We get to peel some of the layers back and see how their unbreakable bond shapes who they become as adults, the choices and sacrifices they make. Driven by strong character development, this is as much a beautiful portrait of human connections as the book's cover.