Commonwealth

It was only once I finished Commonwealth by Ann Patchett and went to update my goodreads that I realized I had never read the full description of the book. I knew it was a tale about two families who become joined spanning five decades. Commonwealth is the July title for my community book club. I would have started to read it regardless of the description. In retrospect, I wonder if knowing what was going to happen would have impacted the way I felt about the book.

On goodreads.com, I gave Commonwealth a 4-star reading. If half stars were possible, I would have given it 3-stars. There's something about Ann Patchett's language that draws me in. I love the way she weaves a story, sprinkling bits of foreshadowing here and there. Sometimes, there was just a little something that I can't put my finger of that made me not love the story. I liked it. Just didn't love it. Commonwealth is a character study. Yes, the plot moves forward and there is a climax and resolution at the end. But not a whole lot really happens and I frequently wondered where Patchett was taking the story. Perhaps my feelings about the book will change after next week's book club discussion. That's often the case.

The story starts in 1964 at the christening party of Franny, the daughter of Fix and Beverly, younger sister to Caroline. Albert, husband of Teresa, father of Cal, Holly, Jeanette, with Albie on the way, is married to Teresa. Yet he comes to Franny's christening party (not the christening, just the party) uninvited - and alone. He takes one look at Beverly and his world is changed forever.

Chapter 2 fast forwards the reader 50 years into the future. Fix is dying from cancer and Franny returns to California to take her father for one of his treatments. Over the remaining chapters, the story bounces back and forth between the lives of the blended families and points in the future. We learn a lot about the type of parents Fix, Beverly, Bert and Teresa are. We learn a lot about the type of kids Caroline, Franny, Cal, Holly, Jeanette and Albie are. What we never learn are any of the details of the divorces, just that they happened and that Bert and Beverly end up together. 

At times while reading, I'd think, Oh, this reminds me of The Nest (review here). A bunch of dysfunctional kids, a mother who isn't too involved in their adult lives. But this book is so much more. Family dynamics and the blended families are a big focus in the book. (All that had me wondering about what the relationship my kids will have with their stepbrothers in another 20 or 30 years.)

All 6 kids spend at least two weeks every summer together at Bert and Beverly's home in Virginia. They are often unsupervised and they go off on adventures that I wouldn't have dared gone on as a kid and that would have made me want to lock my own kids up if they'd done these types of things while I was asleep. A tragedy occurs that really changes the trajectory of the lives of each and every one of them.

About halfway through the five decades of the plot line Franny has dropped out of law school and is working as a waitress at the bar of a fancy Chicago hotel. Her all-time favorite author, Leon Posner, walks into the bar and starts flirting with her. It's just the start of a five year relationship. One of my favorite lines in the book comes during the scene where Franny and Leon meet. Leon asks Franny if she ever wanted to be a writer. "No," she said, and she would have told him. "I only wanted to be a reader." Boy, can I relate!

In Leo, Franny finally has someone who seems to truly listen to her. In bits and pieces, she tells him the story of her family. How they became a blended family and what they were like pre- and post- tragedy. Leo who seems to have been in a writing slump takes Franny's story and "makes it his own." The bestseller, "Commonwealth" is the result. It's still very obviously Franny's family's story. Who really has the right to tell this story? And who will feel pain as a result of Franny's family story being out there for anyone to read? 

Perhaps through my own personal lens of divorce and blended families, I was particularly drawn to those parts of the story. In some ways, it was like I was judging my divorce against the divorces of these characters. Loyalty towards one parent or the other is an important component in the characterization of all the children. Once again, I could certainly relate. 

In addition to divorce and blended families and different reactions to a shared tragedy, the book deals with finding your own path in life and what it's like to grow older or to have an aging parent.

If you enjoy novels with lyrical language with extremely well-developed characters, some whom you'll like, some whom you'll deplore and some whom you will merely tolerate, then Commonwealth might be a novel for you.