Truth & Beauty

I owe a thank you to Christine of “The Rabbit Lived” blog, for making me aware of the existence of the book, Truth & Beauty, by Ann Patchett.  I’d never read any of Patchett’s fiction, and I’ve actually been feeling quite impatient with fiction lately, but as soon as Christine mentioned that I’d like Truth & Beauty if I liked Autobiography of a Face (by Lucy Grealy), I was sold.

Lucy Grealy and Ann Patchett became best friends during college, eventually becoming roommates, and sharing many years of friendship through letters when Grealy lived in Scotland and New York.  They went through the process of becoming writers together, and I was fascinated by the process of writing professionally.  Patchett talks of a year spent working at Friday’s restaurant, during which she developed characters in her head and fleshed out plot ideas, essentially writing her first novel in her head while waiting tables.  It was very non-glamourous, and I think it’s the first book I’ve read about writing where the author is a real person with a real, regular life.  Granted, both Patchett and Grealy participate in some great writing workshops, teach writing at university, go on writing retreats, etc., but for the most part, Patchett lives a very normal existence.  It’s Grealy who lives life on the edge, wanting to experience everything to the fullest as she deals with years of facial recontruction surgery (and surgery failures), after a childhood bout with cancer leaves her with only a partial lower jaw.  I was afraid I wouldn’t like Lucy Grealy, would find her too demanding and narcissistic, but she comes across as very “normal” in her wants and desires, if a bit more extroverted than the average person.  Grealy eventually dies, perhaps due to some excesses of living, or perhaps because her body just gives out after repeated surgeries, and I was certainly left with a sense of loss.  Patchett did a wonderful job of capturing a very normal friendship with a rather extraordinary person, and I think Lucy Grealy would have been proud to read about herself through Ann Patchett’s eyes.  I subsequently picked up Lucy Grealy’s only other book, a collection of essays called, As Seen on TV: Provocations, and it just served to reinforce what a wonderful and adventurous thinker Grealy was.  I really am sorry she won’t be writing any more books.  As for Ann Patchett, I think I’ll say away from her fiction just because of my anti-fiction mood, but if she wants to write more non-fiction, I’m there.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 12/05 at 07:47 PM

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