2.29 Truth and Beauty: A Friendship by Ann Patchett

Good book but a bad choice for a vaction read. By the end, I wanted to sob myself to sleep. Patchett traces the story of herself and her best friend and the trials and tribulations of that relationship.

Here's some personal stuff: I have a hard time making and keeping friends. Most of the time, I'm perfectly happy curling up into myself and living the life of a hermit crab. So when I do make friends and then somehow miraculously keep them, I have a hard time letting go. About a year ago, a dear friend of mine, with whom I thought I was very close, up and disappeared. Over a period of a few months, she stopped calling me back, e-mailing me, and cancelled our outings at the last minute. And then she moved away. We went from seeing each other or talking together almost every day to no contact whatsoever. I was crushed. I still am. I have no idea what happened. I am worried about her. I don't know if I'll ever hear from her again. Reading this brought all of that back. While I was staying up late one night in Cesky Krumlov finishing this, I was not just crying for Ann and Lucy, I was crying for me too.

This book is intense. It's well written and intimate. Patchett doesn't hold back, nor does she try to make excuses for what happened. She also gives good insight into the life of authorship and the struggle for success and for oneself.