Literary Fiction · Free kit
Tom Lake
Spring 2020, a northern Michigan cherry orchard, three grown daughters home from a stalled world. While they pick, they finally pry the story out of their mother: a New Hampshire girl who kept being cast as Emily in Our Town, a summer-stock company called Tom Lake, and a few months with a magnetic young actor who later became famous. Patchett braids harvest days with that edited past — first love against a marriage that stayed, the lives parents lead before anyone calls them Mom, and the question of how much of a story the people who love you are owed.
“There is no explaining this simple truth about life: you will forget much of it. The painful things you were certain you'd never be able to let go? Now you're not entirely sure when they happened, while the thrilling parts, the heart-stopping joys, splintered and scattered and became something else. Memories are then replaced by different joys and larger sorrows, and unbelievably, those things get knocked aside as well, until one morning you're picking cherries with your three grown daughters and your husband goes by on the Gator and you are positive that this is all you've ever wanted in the world.”
Complete free book club kit
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Plan your meeting
Tom Lake Hosting Guide
A free, printable-minded plan for hosting Tom Lake.
Invite hook
“Cherries, Our Town, and a mother who will tell you the summer with the movie star — on her terms. Ann Patchett's 2023 novel is orchard-quiet, theater-haunted, and built for a table that likes an argument about what parents owe their grown kids.”
The question you’re arguing about: If your mother offered you the highlight reel of her youth, would you take it — or demand the scenes she cut?
Shopping list
- □Fresh cherries in bowls (sweet if you can get them) — the whole book happens with stained fingers
- □Cherry pie or a simple cherry cobbler, plus vanilla ice cream or yogurt
- □Cherry jam on biscuits or a loaf of good bread
- □A pan of lasagna or a baked pasta — farm-kitchen energy, no fuss
- □Cherry lemonade, iced tea, coffee, juice, and sparkling water
- □A handful of cherry branches or dark red cloth, plus a paperback of Our Town as a centerpiece
- □Printed bingo cards, trivia slips, and extra pens
Day-of timeline
- 0–10 minWelcome with cherry lemonade, iced tea, coffee, or sparkling water. Guests take a cherry. Icebreakers only — first jobs, family stories, no plot.
- 10–20 minTrivia warm-up. Start easy with cherries, Our Town, and the three daughters. Save Capri, the cemetery, and the Boston chapter for after discussion.
- 20–55 minMain discussion: Emily the role vs Emily the daughter, Joe hiding in plain sight, Pallace, the no-children announcement, what Lara withholds, the burial. Leave a content pause on the table.
- 55–70 minSpeed debate: Was Lara right to keep the Boston chapter from her daughters? Timer on. This one will try to steal the night.
- 70–80 minBingo leftover squares, rate the book in one word (ban "lyrical" — make them work), vote on next month.
Surprise touch
Put a bowl of cherries in the middle of the table and a small stack of blank cards. Mid-evening, ask each person to write one ordinary moment from the past year they would want to watch twice — a chore, a drive, someone going by outside — then read a few aloud if people want. It is cheap, specific to Our Town's Emily begging to look again, and it lets the room touch the book's claim that the Gator in the trees is the whole point.
Wrap-up
- □Group photo with the cherry bowl and a paperback of Our Town (or a sun hat) as the prop
- □Quick rating: 1–5 stars and one word each (try to ban lyrical and gorgeous)
- □Vote on next month's book together