Whistler

by Ann Patchett

A Katie Couric Book Club Pick / One of President Obama's '26 Summer Reading List Picks / A Good Housekeeping Book Club Pick / A GoodReads Most Anticipated Book of Summer

“Ann Patchett’s new novel is a rare phenomenon in contemporary a novel both majestic and intimate, original and masterful in its structure, crystalline in its prose, revelatory in its insights, utterly devastating yet ultimately uplifting in its emotional impact. . . . I think it is her best novel yet.” ―The Boston Globe

The acclaimed, prize-winning #1 New York Times bestselling writer returns with a moving, luminous novel that reminds us of the sweetness and impermanence of life and the power of connection to defy time.

When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now fifty-three, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives. Meeting again, time falls away; while their relationship was brief, it had a profound impact on them both, and now that they are reunited, they have no intention of ever being separated again.

Whistler is a story about two adults looking back over the choices they made, and the choices that were made for them. It’s a story about bravery, memory, the often small yet consequential moments that define our lives, and the endless stream of loss that in time comes for us all. Beautiful in its simplicity, it is ultimately about how love endures, and how the feeling of being known by one other person, even for a short period of time, can change everything.

Genres: Fiction, Audiobook, Book Club, Literary Fiction, Contemporary, Family, Adult Fiction

295 pages, Hardcover

First published June 2, 2026

About the author

Patchett was born in Los Angeles, California. Her mother is the novelist Jeanne Ray.

She moved to Nashville, Tennessee when she was six, where she continues to live. Patchett said she loves her home in Nashville with her doctor husband and dog. If asked if she could go any place, that place would always be home. "Home is ...the stable window that opens out into the imagination."

Patchett attended high school at St. Bernard Academy, a private, non-parochial Catholic school for girls run by the Sisters of Mercy. Following graduation, she attended Sarah Lawrence College and took fiction writing classes with Allan Gurganus, Russell Banks, and Grace Paley. She later attended the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts, where she met longtime friend Elizabeth McCracken. It was also there that she wrote her first novel, The Patron Saint of Liars.

In 2010, when she found that her hometown of Nashville no longer had a good book store, she co-founded Parnassus Books with Karen Hayes; the store opened in November 2011. In 2012, Patchett was on the Time 100 list of most influential people in the world by TIME magazine.

Reviews

[Brady Lockerby]

i genuinely have no idea how i feel about this book! i enjoyed the story and even more so, listening to Ann Patchett's narration of it, but something was... missing for me? i agree with every 5 star review i have read, although it doesn't feel like a 5 star for me personally. 3.5? that feels too low.. 4? easy way out.. maybe i'll just leave it un-starred!

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

we ride at dawn for Eddie

[Haley pham · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book felt like a hug. One of those novels so good, you forget to see the form of the novel. The scenes felt like tapes of real people talking.

[Liz Hein · Rating 5 out of 5]

I woke my husband up from a deep sleep to make him read the last paragraph of this. So here’s, a quick little personal review of Whistler…I’ll write a full and real review closer to its June publication.

Sometimes a book comes to you at the perfect time. I was sitting at the airport with my mom and husband last night, waiting to fly to our family in Texas for Thanksgiving. We ALWAYS host at my parents house; it’s my mom’s very favorite holiday. But we lost dad this year, and can’t fathom our normal routine without him. I had no idea Whistler was a father/daughter story, but I knew I loved Ann Patchett and something told me to just log into netgalley to see if maybe it had popped up, despite having tried to find it literally that morning and it wasn’t there.

I devoured this. The father daughter story isn’t like mine in most ways, but was exactly like mine in the ways I didn’t know I needed it to be. This book is so special to me for so many reasons, and again, I’ll share more later. For now, what I think you should know is that this book is nice and lovely in the ways Tom Lake was nice and lovely. And this book healed me in small ways I won’t forget.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ My New Favorite Book of the Year (2026)

“…‘stepfather’ being an honorific bestowed or withheld by the stepchild.”

I have been immersed in Ann Patchett's world for the past several weeks, in-between other books. It began with “This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage,” which led me to “Truth & Beauty,” then back to re-visiting, “State of Wonder.”

This novel had been sitting on a long waiting list at my local library when, unexpectedly, a copy was donated to my Little Free Library Shed.

Some books simply seem destined to find us.

“The past is soul-crunching.”

Stepping into this story felt like receiving a warm embrace from a cast of unforgettable characters. Patchett's prose is luminous without ever calling attention to itself. It quietly welcomes readers in, allowing them to settle beside people who feel remarkably real—flawed, complicated, contradictory, and loving. Before long, I wasn't simply reading about their lives. I was living alongside them.

There were moments when Daphne's story felt surprisingly familiar.

Early on, we learn that Daphne doesn't fly. The reason isn't revealed until much later, but her decision becomes a quiet point of acceptance—and occasionally tension—in her marriage to Jonathan.

When I met my husband, Rick, one of the first things I learned was that he loved flying airplanes. I was equally clear that I no longer flew. I hadn't stepped onto an airplane since 1999, and while I would never ask him to give up something he loved, I knew I wasn't going to join him.

For reasons I won't change.

Flying once represented freedom to me. Over time it became an exhausting exercise in delays, missed connections, lost luggage, and mounting stress. The wonder disappeared, replaced by a logistical puzzle I no longer wanted to solve. The emotional cost eventually outweighed the destination.

Like Jonathan, Rick understood my limitations before we married.

“I understood the inconvenience I caused, but other people lived with great burdens.”

Daphne is our narrator, and this is ultimately her story.

We witness her relationship with her sister, Leda, and the complicated love they shared with their mother, Abigail, who divorced their beloved stepfather, Eddie Triplett, when the girls were still young.

“…I remembered that I loved her... I remembered she was a person who had lived her own autonomous life full of mistakes and disappointments and judgments and thwarted love.”

For years Daphne has carried the painful belief that she was somehow responsible for destroying Eddie's marriage to her mother.

When she and Jonathan unexpectedly encounter Eddie at the Metropolitan Museum of Art decades later, the past comes rushing back.

“How was it that a weekday trip to a museum with my husband had plunged me back into childhood at the age of fifty-three?”

What really happened all those years ago? Why did the marriage end? And is it ever too late for a family to better understand the people they once loved?

As Daphne searches for answers, readers discover them alongside her.

At its heart, this is a novel about the family we long for, the family we inherit, and the family we choose. It explores the quiet spaces between love, regret, forgiveness, and the stories we tell ourselves about the people closest to us. There is a revelation at the center of the novel that reshapes everything that came before, and Patchett handles it with extraordinary grace. I won't spoil a single page.

“…now imagine that no one knew, and everything that happened between you and your partner was a secret with potentially damaging consequences, and over time you got very good at keeping everything to yourself.”

This is a deeply compassionate novel about relationships in all their beautiful, imperfect forms. It reminds us that every family carries hidden histories, misunderstood choices, and love that often survives despite them.

And yes, about that cover...

Who—or what—is Whistler? And why the horse? Trust the journey. It becomes one of the novel's many quiet delights.

I also loved that this book celebrates books themselves, sprinkling literary recommendations throughout its pages. Any novel that sends me searching for more books to read earns extra affection.

Last thoughts...

Some novels entertain us. Others stay with us.

This one quietly opened my heart and left it there.

I cannot remember the last time I felt so completely connected to a group of fictional characters. Their joys became mine, their disappointments hurt, and by the final pages I found myself reluctant to say goodbye.

Ann Patchett has written a novel rich with compassion, emotional honesty, and profound insight into what binds families together—even after years of misunderstanding and loss.

Without question, this is my new favorite book of 2026.

“This is the Story of a Happy Marriage” review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

First favorite book of the year, April 2026 – “This Book Made Me Think of You” by Libby Page review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Canadian Jen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading Patchett is like being tucked into a big comfy blanket on a cold day.
Her characters are authentic. Her stories hypnotic. An endearing quality that puts me into the Patchett trance.

Daphne randomly meets up with her once stepdad, Eddie, 40 years later. A chance encounter. He was briefly in that role for only 2 years but the memories of him she holds near and dear.
Whistler is the story of a horse. The story told during a precarious time for the two of them but a story that brought a mountain of emotions back. Fear of loss; of dying; of love. Whistler being a fierce connection to a tragic event that held as much fear as joy for those brief hours. A story that went untold for 40 years.

This is a quiet story of revelations. A reflection of familial relationships, messy ones, dotted line ones, and their complexities. It also speaks of the love that can be found when unburied.

A beautiful Patchett style story.
5⭐️

[Leah Darnell · Rating 3 out of 5]

A beautiful story where nothing happens. It’s great writing but definitely can be missed.

[Rachel Hanes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I finished this book last night, and I still don’t know how to rate it properly. I loved the beautiful watercolor painting of the horse on the cover. I loved the story. I loved our two main characters of Daphne and Eddie. The writing was exceptional and profound. And yet… I’m still not connecting with this.

This story starts out with an older gentleman following Daphne and her husband, Jonathan, around at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, NY. This older gentleman turns out to be Eddie Triplett, who was once her stepfather. Eddie was married to Daphne’s mother for about a year, and after a traumatic event, he left when Daphne was nine years old. They have not been in touch since, and Daphne can’t believe he even recognized her.

Daphne, now 53 years old, and Eddie 76 years old, realize they would love to keep in touch as they have lost so much time together. The two reconnect and become very close. Eddie told Daphne a very special story when she was nine years old, and that story is one that seems to have bonded them together all this time. Others, including Daphne’s sister and husband are just now learning of this story, and how it came to be.

As I mentioned above, the writing in this story was impeccable- to the point where I even began to get teary eyed. As much as I loved the characters, I just couldn’t quite connect. Maybe it’s because I would never be able to (or want) to have a relationship with any of my mother’s exes (that’s a whole other story we don’t want to get into). And also, I feel that if over forty years have gone by, then that person has probably forgotten about me, and I feel like it would be like meeting a stranger again- even if you have shared a traumatic event together.
There’s been people who I haven’t seen in years, and when I do happen to run into them we will exchange pleasantries, promise to call each other or “keep in touch”, but we never do, because well, time has moved on and changed us.

I know this is a much loved book, and I did like it. But if I’m being honest, I don’t think that it is one that I would recommend. Because of that, I think I’m going to settle on three stars for my rating.

[Nilufer Ozmekik · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think I can officially say this is the best fiction I’ve read this year so far, and honestly, when it comes to Ann Patchett, I shouldn’t be surprised anymore. She has this almost unfair ability to take ordinary human lives, complicated relationships, old wounds, missed opportunities, and all the things people carry silently for decades—and somehow turn them into something that feels completely extraordinary. And seeing Whistler among Barack Obama’s favorite books made me ridiculously happy because apparently my reading taste and his can occasionally have a little reunion. 😂

What makes this book so difficult to categorize is also what makes it so special. Is it a family story? A story about grief? A story about memory, forgiveness, regret, found family, second chances? Yes. All of them. But underneath everything, I think this is a book about how much our past can shape the people we become—and how it is never necessarily too late to reclaim a part of yourself that you thought was gone forever.

Daphne Fuller is fifty-three when an unexpected encounter at the Metropolitan Museum of Art brings Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, back into her life after more than four decades apart. Eddie was only part of Daphne’s childhood for a relatively short time, but his presence left an enormous mark on her. He wasn't simply her stepfather. He was the father figure she desperately needed, a mentor, a friend, and someone who made her feel genuinely seen.

And then, suddenly, he was gone.

When Daphne was nine, a terrifying incident involving Eddie became the reason her mother ended their marriage and separated Daphne from someone she loved deeply. Daphne grew up carrying the version of events she had been given, along with all the unanswered questions and guilt that naturally followed. What really happened that night? Why did her mother make the choices she did? And how can something that lasted such a short time continue to have such a massive influence on an entire lifetime?

Four decades later, Daphne and Eddie finally have the opportunity to look at the past with adult eyes rather than through the limited understanding of a frightened child.

And THAT is where Patchett absolutely got me.

Because this isn't a dramatic, sensationalized reunion where everyone suddenly spills every secret and all the wounds magically disappear. It's much more human than that. There is awkwardness, tenderness, regret, humor, resentment, curiosity, grief, and that strange feeling of meeting someone again and realizing that the person you never stopped remembering has continued living an entire life without you.

I loved watching Daphne slowly reconsider the people she thought she understood. Her mother. Her sister. Eddie. Herself.

We all create narratives about our childhood because children have to. We take the information available to us and build an explanation around it. Then we grow up and sometimes discover that the story we have carried for decades was only one version of what actually happened.

That idea absolutely wrecked me.

And then there is Whistler, the horse whose story becomes intertwined with Daphne and Eddie and the mysterious event that connects them. No, this isn't actually a horse novel despite what that gorgeous cover may have you believe. 😂 But Whistler becomes something much bigger than an animal in the story. It becomes a memory, a symbol, a connection, and a piece of unfinished history that refuses to disappear.

The characters are what made this book unforgettable for me. They don't feel like perfectly constructed fictional people delivering beautifully polished dialogue. They feel like people you have actually met. Someone from your family. Someone you used to know. Someone sitting beside you at dinner who has an entire secret emotional universe you know nothing about.

And Patchett's writing—I mean, come on. It's elegant without showing off, emotional without manipulating you, and intelligent without ever making you feel like you're being lectured. I found myself highlighting sentences simply because they made me stop and think about my own relationships, choices, and all those tiny moments that seem insignificant when they're happening but somehow become enormous in retrospect.

There are traumatic and heartbreaking moments here, absolutely, but there is also so much warmth. Resentment doesn't automatically win. Loss doesn't erase love. People make terrible decisions and still love each other. People disappear from our lives and somehow remain part of us. And sometimes, unbelievably, life gives us another opportunity to sit across from someone we thought we'd lost forever.

That was the emotional heart of the book for me.

I also loved how Whistler quietly asks whether we are ever finished becoming ourselves. Daphne isn't twenty anymore. She isn't even thirty. She's fifty-three. And yet there are parts of her that are still waiting for answers, still carrying the little girl she once was, still wondering what her life might have looked like if one decision hadn't changed everything.

Maybe healing isn't about changing the past. Maybe it's about finally understanding it well enough to stop letting it control the future.

And yes, I cried. Obviously. I'm not even going to pretend I didn't. There were moments when I had to put the book down for a second because Patchett was apparently determined to reach directly into my chest and squeeze my heart.

I went into this expecting another beautifully written Ann Patchett novel. I came out feeling like I had met these people.

That is the difference.

5 enormous, emotional, horse-covered stars. 🐎❤️

medium.com
instagram
facebook
twitter

[Emily May · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I'm glad you didn't tell me that," I said, thinking of how his case for human decency had informed my life. I believed him, and by believing him, I had found it to be true.

It can be hard to review a book like this— one which has a lot of emotional depth but where relatively little happens. And the majority of what does happen is in flashback, making reflection the novel’s primary lens. But Patchett does not require an epic plot to deliver a poignant tale.

Whistler begins with an encounter between Daphne and her former stepfather, who has been absent from her life for more than forty years. As the two reconnect, however, it becomes clear that this man, Eddie, left a lasting impact on Daphne, his influence extending far beyond the brief years they spent together.

There's more being said, too. About stories— those told and those left untold —and the far-reaching consequences they can have. It is also about how one event, one story, one passion, one relationship from youth can colour a person's entire life. This plays out in numerous forms— Daphne and Eddie's fateful car accident, her mother's first love, Buddy's passion for the sea, the tale of Whistler... all of it calling them back, no matter how much time has passed or how far removed they may seem.

It is about how some things always come back to us, or, indeed, never really leave.

Early on, I saved this quote because I thought it was beautiful:

Oh, this moment, when all the leaves were fresh and the lilacs were out and New York seemed like the best idea. The present, I wanted to say to my husband, let's live here.

I did not know it would turn out to be so ironic. Daphne is quickly disabused of any notion of living in the present: her past resurfaces, while an uncertainty about the future underpins many of her decisions.

The characters are richly drawn and complex, as I would expect from Patchett, and Eddie is especially charming. Readers who enjoy thoughtful character studies and quiet meditations on the forces that shape our lives should like this one. I love how it's not really about the things that happen, but what stays with us.

[Angela M · Rating 5 out of 5]

“There were things I remembered now, including that particular longing that life could stay as it had been. How strange that such a pointless wish could resurface after all these years.” Still, Daphne Fuller at fifty three, imagines at times what life would have been like these last forty four years, had her mother not divorced her step-father Eddie and separated her from this man who she loves deeply. Reconnecting with Eddie after all those years turns out to be a beautiful thing for both of them as they relive the past, their indelible bond of love and shared trauma, and now can bask in the joy of finding each other again. Patchett reminds us, though that life is complicated, relationships are complex and families are messy.

In this novel marriages are made based on love, but unrealistic expectations make promises of good intentions impossible to keep in spite of the fact that the love remains. Ann Patchett does an extraordinary job at getting to the very heart of broken families and the effect on lives as time passes. She reminds us that things are not always as they seem and the whole story needs to be revealed. And so the story of this family unfolds, reflecting on the past, accepting the present and moving forward each day with the light of the revelations that tell of so much love.

I’ve read all of Ann Patchett’s novels and two memoirs and loved them all. Whistler is reminiscent of her more recent novels The Dutch House, Commonwealth, and Tom Lake , all of which focus on families . If you loved any of those, I think you’ll find that she once again establishes herself as a literary treasure.

I received a copy of this book from HarperCollins through Edelweiss.

[Meike · Rating 2 out of 5]

Listen, you have to give it to Ann Patchett that she is an excellent writer of people and moods, and I see why so many readers describe this as a comfort read that fails to reach the depth of Patchett's classic bangers, but I also found "Whistler" so twee and somehow cutesy that I'm throwing in the towel at 53%. Patchett tells the story of Daphne, a married middle-aged teacher with three step dads who coincidentally runs into her favorite of the trio, a man she hasn't seen in many years - and only now does she discover the true reason why he and her mother got divorced.

So this is a family story, full of vivid characters, talking about mothers and daughters, siblings, husbands and wives, and how we can choose and lose the people we consider family. Nothing wrong with the character writing or the message, but it's a little shallow and unchallenging. Yes, we're all human and messy, but this is needs to develop more drive and punch to become really emotionally impactful - but then again, I require a certain degree of unsettlement to be really impressed by fiction, and this is not what Patchett aims to do here, I think she wants to hug her readers and cover them in a warm blanket of a story about love and forgiveness and second chances.

And that's too much for me by way of being not enough.

[Ron Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ann Patchett’s new novel, Whistler, is that loveliest of summer gifts, a story of reconciliation, of old affections renewed, of a family’s circumference enlarged. Fans of the author’s previous work will open these pages like an old shoebox of family photos. Newcomers — how I envy them those first moments — will discover a writer of gentle wit and quiet grace.

Whistler, Patchett’s 10th novel, may be her most essayistic and in that sense her most confident. This is a reflection on fatherhood largely unruffled by the exigencies of plot. You’ll wait in vain for the terror of Bel Canto or the thrills of State of Wonder. Yes, it contains a moment of real peril, but the sting of fear has been mellowed over time like onions caramelized by heat.

Whistler begins in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but unlike Donna Tartt’s novel The Goldfinch, the explosion that takes place is merely a chance encounter that blows away four decades of separation. One day while strolling through Modern and Contemporary Paintings, Daphne and her husband become aware that an older gentleman is following her. She’s not particularly....

Continue reading:
https://roncharles.substack.com/p/ann...

[Teres [on hiatus] · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ann Patchett’s Whistler is a slim novel of roughly 300 pages, but boy, does it pack a wallop.

SO good.

Fifty-three-year-old Daphne Fuller spots an elderly stranger following her and her husband through the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her mother’s second husband, who vanished from Daphne's life when she was nine years old.

The story unfolds like a carefully preserved memory. Patchett cleverly employs a non-linear structure that mirrors the workings of memory itself.

The reader experiences Daphne and Eddie's reunion much as she does: fragments surface, contexts shift, and what seemed simple in childhood reveals itself as devastatingly complex from an adult perspective.

Eddie’s marriage to Daphne’s mother lasted barely 18 months, yet the bond he formed with his young stepdaughter proved more enduring than the legal ties that briefly made them family.

Patchett has created a moving story about how we carry those who mattered even after they’re gone. Proof that love and memory can traverse vast distances.

Love, even in its briefest iterations, endures.

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

An amazingly beautiful story!
Daphne Fuller is a married English Teacher who runs into Eddie Triplett, her favorite ex stepfather while she and her husband are at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York… she has not seen him in 40 years.
They have a past together that includes a serious car wreck… she was only 9 yrs old at the time and soon afterward her mother divorced Eddie.
Seeing him again brings forth the feelings she had buried… of Eddie being the happiest part of her childhood, though his marriage to her mother was very brief.
She realizes that.. “Somewhere deep inside myself, in a place inaccessible to me since I was nine,” Daphne tells us, “I had missed him every day of my life.”
The story tells us more of the family’s story and the accident, and the recent reconciliation.
Just lovely… my very favorite Patchett novel that I have read so far!

[Terrie R · Rating 5 out of 5]

Daphne and Jonathan Fuller notice an older gentleman following them during an afternoon visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. Daphne eventually recognizes him as Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather who was married to her mother until she was nine years old. They haven't seen each other in almost 45 years, separated after an incident that changed the trajectory of both their lives.

When Daphne hears Eddie's voice, she cries. She never cries. Eddie calls her "Duck", and she feels herself break and fall backward in time. They both knew from that moment on, they would never lose touch with each other again...

Whistler is the only book I've read that made my eyes well with tears after reading the last sentence of the first chapter. What a way to start a book, but it didn't end there. Patchett's beautiful prose continued to surprise me throughout. This is the only novel I've read by this author that I love. I read and rated The Dutch House 2⭐, and Tom Lake 3⭐, not feeling a connection to the writing or the story in either book. This was a breakthrough read for me with this author, and I felt giddy during and after I finished.

I read the DRC while listening to the audiobook with Ann Patchett’s perfect narration that was surprisingly animated. She made all these characters feel believable to me, and I longed for a relationship like the one Daphne had with Eddie. This is a book you should read and listen to for all the highlighting you'll do, and for the wonderful narration you'll hear. The combination is a memorable immersive reading experience.

Whistler is my favorite book of this year so far. Looking at the beautiful cover reminds me to mention the horse of the same name who has a small part in the story, but a significant importance and a deep connection between the two main characters, Daphne and Eddie. All the pieces and parts of this story make me smile from ear to ear with the love and joy of reading. Corny, but true!

5⭐

Thank you to Harper and Ann Patchett for the gifted DRC through NetGalley. This is my honest and voluntary review.

[Susan Meissner · Rating 5 out of 5]

The only thing I don’t like about an Ann Patchett book is coming to the end of it. She is the most gentle of storytellers but her themes are always so profound. She is a master at this gig. Lest you think the story is about a horse because of the cover, it bears saying that the story is about found family, and how we are shaped by the people that matter to us in our childhood. There is a horse, and there wouldn’t be a story without it, but the story is not about a horse. It’s about love.

[ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

i just love meandering family stories like this - i absolutely adored the last book i read by this author, and this one was no different. there’s something about her writing that just makes these characters feel so real. adored this!

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ann Patchett is a master of literary fiction, particularly when it comes to writing about lives that seem ordinary at first glance but reveal remarkable depth upon closer examination. Few authors can take seemingly unremarkable people and transform their everyday experiences into something profound and memorable. Ann Patchett does it effortlessly.

In "Whistler", 53-year-old Daphne Fuller is visiting The Met with her husband when she unexpectedly encounters her first stepfather, Eddie Triplett. Readers familiar with Patchett's work and personal history know that she often explores the complexities of blended families, having grown up with both a father and stepfathers herself. Daphne hasn't seen Eddie since she was nine years old. Of all her mother's husbands, he was her favorite, not only because they shared a love of books, but because they were forever connected by a significant childhood event.

"Whistler" is a quiet, gentle story in which Daphne recounts that long-ago event to her sister, setting in motion a reflection on her life and family history. Shortly after the incident, their mother divorced Eddie with little explanation, leaving the sisters confused and bewildered. In the years since, their mother remarried, their father died, and life carried on without Eddie. Now, after decades apart, there is much to remember and even more to understand.

Patchett has always excelled at capturing the emotional reality of children navigating divorce...the confusion, the shifting loyalties, and the profound lack of control over decisions that shape their lives. One of her greatest strengths is her refusal to create villains. None of the characters here are bad people; they are simply flawed human beings doing the best they can, sometimes acting selfishly, often making mistakes, but always remaining recognizably human.

What makes Whistler so moving is its faith in human decency. Patchett reminds us that great literature does not require a villain to sustain a reader's interest. Instead, she shines a light on the best qualities of humanity: kindness, trust, forgiveness, and enduring affection. At its heart, this is the story of a young girl and her stepfather who forge a special bond through shared interests, attention, and trust, a bond that survives even years of separation.

By the novel's end, both young Daphne and the eternally optimistic Eddie will have earned a lasting place in your heart.

I chose the audiobook, narrated by Patchett herself. At first, I wasn't certain I would enjoy her narration, but as the story unfolded, I realized she was the perfect choice. Her voice for young Daphne is particularly charming, and her intimate delivery lends an added warmth and authenticity to the story.

[Snjez · Rating 2 out of 5]

The beginning seemed promising. I liked the bond between Daphne and Eddie and I liked Daphne’s husband, Jonathan. As the story went on, it started dragging for me and became dull, and also really depressing. I can see why some readers loved it, but it’s not my cup of tea.

The audiobook is narrated by the author. Her narration is really slow, which can be fixed, but it doesn’t flow naturally. It sounds like she’s telling the story rather than giving a voice to the characters, and sometimes it’s hard to distinguish between them.

Read for the Goodreads Summer Challenge (Chart Toppers)

[Katie · Rating 5 out of 5]

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (5/5, fiction)
Calling Ann Patchett a talented storyteller is like informing you that an ice cold lemonade is refreshing on a summer day. Tangy, freshly squeezed lemonade was made to be enjoyed with the sun on your face, and Ann Patchett does a masterful job of capturing the human condition.

This is the story of Daphne, a woman who reconnects with her stepfather, a man who was only in her life for two years but who had a profound impact on her.

Quietly profound and poignant. It delves into the complexities of love and loss but still manages to be a feel good book.

A book meant to be enjoyed in a few sittings and then ruminated on for a few hours. I thoroughly enjoyed this story.

A raspberry lime rickey is mentioned in here, and I thought to myself, let’s throw a little booze in there and see how it tastes! If you’d like to forgo the sweet drink, Eddie would pair this with a Chardonnay, and Daphne would recommend a Sancerre!

[Bruce Katz · Rating 5 out of 5]

In September 2020, as the number of Covid fatalities climbed around the world, Ann Patchett published an article in The New Yorker with the title “My Three Fathers.” The autobiographical piece was about the three men her mother married over the course of her life and Ms Patchett’s very different relationships with each of them. Near the end of the article she wrote, “What’s so easy for me to see now that all of them are gone, what was so impossible for me to see at the time, was that they were only occasionally thinking of me, and I was only occasionally thinking of them. From each of the fathers I took the things I needed, and then I turned them into stories.”

Which is what she has done — at least as a framework and a starting point * — in her newest novel, “Whistler.” It’s a touching, insightful, revelatory story about the connections we form in our lives with others and what, despite everything, stays in our hearts through the passing years. It’s also about how difficult and complex our relationships with others can be and how little we understand of our own pasts.

The book’s protagonist is Daphne Fuller. She’s a writing teacher at a private girl's school to whom, inexplicably and interestingly, older men are drawn (“Old guys love me”). Her mother, like Ann Patchett’s, married three times. One day, Daphne and her retired hospital administrator husband Jonathan are spending a quiet afternoon walking through the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan when Jonathan leans in toward Daphne to tell her they’re being followed. Daphne thinks he's being ridiculous, but as it happens, they are being followed. Or more accurately, she is. The “old guy” following her is no stranger, he's her former stepfather Eddie Triplett, whom she hasn’t seen for almost 45 years. To her great surprise, Daphne begins to sob uncontrollably. “I hadn’t known there was something in me to break, but there was and break it did. I stepped into an open crack in time and fell backwards.” Fell backwards into a place she had put away somewhere in the back of her mind and forgotten: “For me, the past was a sinkhole. Not that it was terrible, but there was nothing for me there.”

Over the course of the novel, Daphne and Eddie renew their old relationship, which is a very different thing now that the bond is between two adults rather than between a child and an adult. As a young girl, Daphne had adored Eddie, shared a harrowing experience with him. The two of them had a very special bond. Then something happened and Eddie was gone.

“In the way of all children,” Daphne believed that the divorce was her fault. It wasn’t her fault, of course. Nor is her long-held belief that she had ruined Eddie’s life. As she and Eddie spend more time together she will learn that the memories she formed as a child and that shaped so much of her adult life were completely wrong. The dramatic events she remembers so vividly did not happen as she remembered them. It’s a difficult and emotionally draining process (“I’m too old to be nine again”) that forces her to feel things she hadn't felt before, reappraise a great many things about herself and others close to her, particularly because Eddie is dying.

As she gets to know the real Eddie — as he was and is — she is forced to face a lot of things about herself and those she is close to. One day she has a conversation with her sister Leda — a psychologist who writes a column called “Your Therapist” — in which the two of them discuss their childhood. Their mother, Leda says, “decided the past was happy and so she has no reason to think about it.” When Daphne asks where the two of them fit into that narrative, her sister’s response is direct: “ ‘We don’t,” she said.’"

(Daphne's relationship with her mother is a fascinating thread to follow in the book. Daphne will wonder,“Why did my mother always make me feel like a telemarketer calling to rope her into a time-share?” and make this observation: "I couldn't say exactly where childhood ends, but dealing with your pregnant mother at the age of thirteen was as good a place as any to wrap it up.")

I found “Whistler” to be a quietly powerful look at how memory works, how little we know about what makes others — and ourselves — act the way they do, the things that bind us to one another, and looking honestly into our past. In other hands it might have been maudlin or manipulative, but Patchett is at her best here. Truthfully, I want to say as little as possible about “Whistler” because inside Daphne's head as she learns about herself and her past is such a joy. Patchett rolls out the story with honesty, tenderness, and insight. I have to say, I identified with a lot in the book, not always comfortably. I believe others will too.

My deepest thanks to Harper Publishers and Edelweis+ for providing a free digital ARC in return for an honest review.


* In an interview with Publisher’s Weekly,” Ms Patchett spoke about her discomfort writing a novel about a character who had three fathers just as she did: “I thought, oh, I can’t do that, because people will think it’s me. But I decided, I don’t care what people think. It’s right for the book.”

[Laura Pursell Byrnes · Rating 2 out of 5]

It feels sacrilegious leaving a 2-star review on anything written by Ann Patchett. I expected more because I truly enjoy her writing, particularly her essays. I've come to the conclusion that (right now, anyway) she is much more effective a writer when dealing with the short form.

The author of "Truth and Beauty" and "The Dutch House" really fell short here (her 10th novel), and I get the uncomfortable feeling that "The Whistler" was written on deadline. She knows her audience, she drew heavily (and unashamedly) from her own life, and knocked this one out in record time. She stated in a recent interview that she didn't "try as hard" with this one, and I have to say, it shows. I know this is terribly harsh, but I can't tell you how many times I simply had to pause in the middle of a page and roll my eyes.

Daphne, the lead character is Ann Patchett. Let's just get that out of the way. She is an aspiring writer with a mother who is a literary publicist, a mother who has been married three times. (Does any of this sound familiar?) Daphne is the perfect child, the athlete, the smart one.

The character of Eddie is so perfect and warm and kind with no flaws whatsoever (never mind that he drives a car off a mountain top with a 9-year old inside, never mind that he marries a women even though he's gay). The man is Jesus.

He needed some fleshing out as a character, but with all the narrative exposition stuffed in every page, there was no room.

Ann Patchett creates a mother who agrees to marry Eddie if he "gives up being gay". I kid you not. Now, ok. Maybe this was in the late 1970's but even in the 1970's, I don't see how this tracks on any level of plausibility. This is supposedly an intelligent woman working as a publicist in NYC. Any re-assessment we are supposed to have of the mother as the story chugs along is a moot point.

I had to look up interviews with the author, simply so I could understand how and why Ann Patchett told this story, in this way. She mentioned "kindness". There is a part in the story toward the end when Eddie (trapped in the car with the 9 year old, the car he drove off the mountaintop), tells Daphne that she needs to go get help. She is afraid to knock on doors because she has been told never to do that. Eddie assures her that most of the people in the world are actually good people, not bad people, and with this gentle prodding, off she goes into the snowy tundra to knock on strangers' doors. And Patchett discussed this in an interview, this notion of kindness, which she learned from the nuns at St. Bernard. (For the record, I also went to St. Bernard, and I know these nuns, from the Sisters of Mercy. I digress.) But if seeing and recognizing kindness was the impetus for this novel, it was certainly lost on this reader.

Patchett wrote an essay titled "My Three Fathers", which appears in her book of essays, "These Precious Days". It's a wonderful essay on the abundance of different types of love and life lessons she gained from each of them. So what does she do when she decides to write her next bestseller? SHE GIVES DAPHNE THREE FATHERS.

Patchett's husband is a much older ER physician. So...of course...Daphne's husband is a much-older hospital administrator. And he is SO KIND. The kind of man who insists she call as soon as she find a taxi. As soon as she reaches the train. The kind of man everyone loves. Even Daphne's mother loves him.

And since we can assume at this point that the novel is semi-autobiographical or at least inspired by her own life, I think I physically cringed when Eddie described Daphne as "this dream child".."line up all the daughters in the world - you're never going to find a girl as good as this one."

The story of "Whistler" (the horse who graces the cover of the book) is the one redeeming part of this story. Rather than spoil it, I'll just say it has to do with dead people and loved ones coming back to save you. The horse is not a character in the story. It's the one profound moment in the book and Ann Patchett has a way of arriving at beautiful moments. And there were a few.

But overall, this book feels like Ann Patchett on anti-depressants. De-fanged, de-clawed, and just really nice.

(yawn)

Lest I be forbidden to ever enter the doors of Parnassus (her Nashville bookstore) again, let me close by saying that I love what Ann Patchett has done for the business of books, for reading books, for giving Nashville this really cool place in Green Hills to hang out, read, socialize and have readings. They even allow dogs.

And at the top of her form, she is a brilliant writer. I bought extra copies of "Truth and Beauty" to share with my friends. That's the Ann Patchett I want to read.

[Nick Parry · Rating 5 out of 5]

When reading a book, the thing I’m always most impressed by is an authors ability to pull something out of me that I may not have known was there. It usually isn’t something I can definitively explain. “This book made me smile, this book made me cry”. All true, but this book also had me looking inwards at my own relationships as well as outwardly at how those same relationships may have shaped not only myself, but the people around me. It had me thinking about people I haven’t seen in decades.

I loved this book so much. Eddie and Daphne’s story was just what I needed right now and I won’t soon forget them.

The queen of gentle storytelling has done it again.

[Melissa (Always Behind) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Compelling, gorgeously written book. I didn't want it to end.

Daphne Fuller and her husband visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and they notice an elderly man following them around. When they talk to him, Daphne realizes that the man is Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather she hasn't seen for over forty years--in the aftermath of an accident that occurred when Daphne was nine. Over the coming weeks, they get to know each other again and spend time thinking back about what happened in the past.

It's difficult to capture what this book is actually about. It's about family, memories, grief, and how the choices we make affect our lives. The characters are richly drawn, and the story about what happens in the past unfolds at a deliberate, yet steady pace. I was always drawn back to the story, wanting to read more and know more about them.

Although there's a horse on the cover and there is a horse named Whistler featured in the book, the central story has absolutely nothing to do with horses. This is a tale about family most of all. The features that make us a family and the things that break a family apart.

There's not a lot of turmoil in this book, and I think that might be a bit of a turn off for some readers who like high drama and conflict. For me, though, this was the perfect book at the perfect time. I needed a gentle, emotional story and this novel delivers that fully. I read another review that says that everything works out a little too perfectly, but isn't that okay sometimes? We don't always need angsty heartbreaking stories, sometimes one filled with hope, a bit of humor, and a great deal of heart is needed.

I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book, all opinions are my own

[Karen.J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 ⭐️

I listened to this wonderful audiobook, such a beautiful and heartfelt story. Written and narrated by Ann Patchett.

[Liana Gold · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5! Ohh how I love books about the power of connection and a love that endures despite aging and loss..This is a literary novel about how people impact and shape our lives.


Daphne Fuller is our 53 year old protagonist who lives a quiet life with her husband in NYC. While visiting the MET, she encounters Eddie Triplett, a stepfather she adored as a child but has not seen him for over forty years. This encounter prompts Daphne to revisit her memories about her childhood and her mother's marriages. As Daphne reconnects with Eddie, she begins to understand how memory changes over time and the ways childhood carries over into adulthood.


Full review to follow!!

[Dorie - Cats&Books :) · Rating 5 out of 5]

***NOW AVAILABLE - ONE OF MY TOP 5* OF THE YEAR***

This novel had all that I love in literary fiction – a unique and immersive story with wonderful characters that I didn’t want to leave at the end.

From the blurb: “When Daphne Fuller and her husband Jonathan visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art, they notice an older, white-haired gentleman following them. The man turns out to be Eddie Triplett, her former stepfather, who had been married to her mother for a little more than year when Daphne was nine. Now fifty-three, Daphne hasn’t seen Eddie for many years, not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives”.

This novel is beautifully written with prose that I underlined and came back to read again.

There is a photo of a horse named “Whistler” on the cover but the novel isn’t about horses just so you all know. At a pivotal point in the novel Eddie is telling Daphne a story about a girl and her horse whom she trained to come when she whistled. It is a story about courage, strength and love between animals and humans.

This novel is storytelling at its best. I was so immersed in the story that I couldn’t put it down. The characters are so well drawn that I felt I knew them - I wanted the story about all of them to continue.

For everyone who loves literary fiction with incredible writing - you will love this one!

I received an ARC of this novel from the publisher through Edelweiss. It was my pleasure to read and review this title.

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

I buzzed through Whistler, a quiet and elegantly written narrative that kept me thinking and empathizing from start to finish. Family bonds, memory (the way we store and recall the past), illness and loss are the major themes, but there is also a decades-past shared and critical event-- a car accident--that gives rise to the eponymous title of the book. The cover shows Whistler, and the story of this beautiful horse is tender and central to the novel in richly thematic ways. Sentimental at intervals, but not syrupy. Memories give rise to introspection, and introspection to memories. Moreover, Patchett nails the way a nine-year-old girl thinks, acts, and feels.

The main protagonist is fifty-three-year-old Daphne Fuller, happily married for two decades to her seventy-one-year-old husband, Jonathan, a retired hospital administrator. Daphne teaches high school English and loves her job and cherishes literature and art. One day, at the Met with her husband, her former stepfather, Edward Triplett, spots her and they reconnect after forty-four years of not seeing each other.

Edward is an editor that has worked at several of the top publishing houses. Daphne and Edward’s love of literature is still a lovely bond they share. Four decades ago they both wanted to be writers. But, of course, life happens. Ann Patchett will have you turning the pages readily in a largely subdued narrative through strong characters and themes. Whistler is a complex story told with a graceful simplicity.

The narrative gently conveys the answers-- why Edward and Daphne's family disconnected; Edward’s divorce from her mother; and the rise of buried memories and new discoveries. The way we recall events from childhood may be psychologically simplified or askew, but also tender and revealing in the stories that emerge. Daphne's husband is also digging away at the past via the recent death of his mother--a subplot that is also subtext. Emptying out his mother's house also releases memories of youth.

Whistler reveals that Patchett and Daphne share a devotion to stories. Stories liberate our psyches; there's a fluid valve between stories and memories. We recover and heal from the diaries of our past, which open our hearts to the vibrant here-and-now. That's a potent theme in Whistler: Stories connect us and unite our humanity.

Somewhere, I read that Ann Patchett had two stepfathers, like Daphne, as well as a beloved father. However, I highly doubt this is autofiction. Ann Patchett is a veteran, prize-winning author who may borrow a few minor facts of her life, but uses her imagination to construct a fully fictional world. Her confidence and vulnerability as a writer, two traits that have built a secure fan base, make all her novels seem effortless and organic. This is a must for Patchett aficionados and I suspect will add new devotees.

A grateful thank-you to Harper Collins for sending me an ARC to read and review. What a blessing! Ann Patchett is a national treasure.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

An older man trails a happily married couple through the Metropolitan Museum in Manhattan. He turns out to be the long estranged stepfather to half that couple, a woman named Daphne. In the hands of many novelists, this opening -- and it's terrific -- would be the start of a tense mystery or tale of resurrected childhood horrors. Ah, but we are in the hands of Ann Patchett, and instead of a dark tale of suspense, we have a deeply moving family saga about that stepfather, Eddie Triplett (a book editor) his stepdaughter (an English teacher), Daphne's mother (a retired book publicist), and the car accident that Eddie and Daphne survived when she was nine and he drove them off a cliff (by mistake), but also ended his marriage to Daphne's mother and led to his exile from the family. There are dozens of moments in a story that moves seamlessly between the car accident and the present that had me nodding at their beauty and authenticity and the richness of the emotions, but they all circle back perfectly to the tale Eddie shares with Daphne when the two of them are trapped in that car and he is trying to keep her calm -- a tale of a horse named Whistler and one of the most poignant rescues I've read. Another modern classic from Ann Patchett.