The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett is one of the best books you’ll read this year. I picked it up the day of its release, knowing I’d liked her previous books, but this may be the best yet. Right from the start the writing is delicious, the observances of family dynamics astute.

At the centre of the story is a house, the Dutch House. Built by the Van Hoebeeks in the early 1920s, the house sat on a large plot of land near Philadelphia. When Cyril Conroy bought it just after the Second World War it had been empty for some years but just as the Van Hoebeeks left it on their deaths, fully furnished and a perfect period piece. Cyril bought it as a home for his young wife, Elna, and their baby daughter, Maeve. A son, Danny, was born there, seven years younger than Maeve.

When Danny was only three his mother chose to leave the house and the privileged lifestyle she hated – leaving her children as well. Some years later Cyril re-marries, his second wife Andrea “who lingered like a virus” after first coming into the house. In fact, we suspect Andrea loves the house more than she loves her husband. She brings with her two daughters, Norma and Beatrice “Bright”. From the beginning Maeve and Danny dislike Andrea, and her children, Danny more than Maeve who mothers them all. Cyril’s early death changes everything. Cyril and Elna’s children are moved out and Andrea has sole possession of the house and the wealth.

Maeve and Danny share a mutual hatred for Andrea, a love for each other, and the profound, shared, loss of their mother. But, they make a life – Maeve is employed and providing a home of sorts for Danny as he studies to become a doctor at Maeve’s insistence. Danny marries, as is expected, and has children.

Maeve and Danny have different memories of their childhood, Maeve being so much older when their mother left. Danny asks his sister, “Do you think it’s possible to see the past as it actually was?” She believes so, but Danny wonders, “But we overlay the present onto the past. We look back through the lens of what we know now, so we’re not seeing it as the people we were, we’re seeing it as the people we are, and that means the past has been radically altered.” And that is the beauty of this novel. As all of the events of the past play out against the future while the story progresses from the young Maeve and Danny to the middle aged siblings who face the challenges of what comes into their lives.

And always, the Dutch house is there, as the world changes around it, the Dutch house remains the same. Maeve and Danny park their car sometimes and simply sit and look at the house that was once their home, as they try to make sense of what went on there, and mourn what could have been. They grew up knowing only part of the truth of how things were when they were children – and what has happened since.

It is only many years later, when some of those who knew Maeve and Danny when they were young children, come back into their lives, that they learn more of what went on in the past, and the possible motives behind the actions of their parents and other people in their young lives. Danny and Maeve, so affected by their childhood loss must get on with life regardless, they must forgive those who harmed them, intentionally or not, and make a meaningful life before it is all too late. Maeve urges Danny to use the time left in this life to be happy, something he finds it very hard to do.

The Dutch House seemed at first, simply the story of a house and a family, but by the end it was so much more. Readers will cry for all of the hurt and all of the lost years for all of the characters that Ann Patchett has made so real, and hope that they do indeed make the most of the years they have left to live.