Truth & Beauty : A Friendship

Rating:
Summary: What a moving piece
Review: <br /><br />This is a moving piece of literature filled with warmth from the heart and friendship that knows no bounds. Inspirational,sweet,beautiful. <br />Also recommended: Secret Life Of Bees,Nightmares Echo,She's Come Undone,Three Weeks With My Brother

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Summary: Patchett's Frank and Tender First Work of Nonfiction
Review: Female friendships are one of the most complex human relationships, regardless of age. And in TRUTH & BEAUTY, author Ann Patchett does nothing to dispel the mystery of girlfriends. If anything, she adds to it.

Although this book is nonfiction, it reads like fiction. Readers will dive into the story, greedily gathering information about the two main subjects --- Patchett and her friend, Lucy Grealy --- like characters in a novel. They were two young and ambitious women who go directly from Sarah Lawrence to the Iowa's Writers Workshop, the most coveted graduate school for writers. They develop a friendship that straddles the lines of intimacy, and they find literary fame. Along the way they form a bond that is difficult to describe. It spans continents, weathers illnesses both physical and mental, and seems to survive even death. But this is not a work of fiction, and so the eloquent writing of this well-known author packs even more of a punch. These are real people; this is Patchett's life, her beloved friend who lives, metaphorically speaking, just beyond her reach.

Patchett recreates her life with Grealy by interspersing their history with letters she received from Grealy over the years, postmarked from Scotland, New York, Providence, Connecticut, and all of the other places she traveled, taught and lived. They are letters that reveal a literary voice filled with love and admiration for a woman to whom she referred as "Pet." She was a competitive woman who was known to jump into Patchett's lap and ask repeatedly, "Am I your favorite? Do you love me the most?" And inevitably the answer was yes.

"Dearest Anvil, she would write to me six years later, dearest deposed president of some now defunct but lovingly remembered country, dearest to me, I can find no suitable words of affection for you, words that will contain the whole of your wonderfulness to me. You will have to make due with being my favorite bagel, my favorite blue awning above some great little café where the coffee is strong but milky and had real texture to it."

Narrated by Patchett, TRUTH & BEAUTY could be described as an analysis of Grealy, a woman who fights an uphill battle to recover physically from a cancer that robbed her of her outward beauty as a child, though it amplified an inner beauty. Grealy, as Patchett tells us, had a kind of animal magnetism that drew the best of people to her. She underwent at least 35 surgeries to rebuild a jaw decimated by radiation and lived her life subsisting on mashed fruits, ice cream and the occasional milkshake. Despite the staggering number of surgeries, the procedures never quite worked and much of Grealy's life was spent lamenting what she believed were her physical inadequacies. Yet TRUTH & BEAUTY is not a sad story. In fact, it features the gifts of Grealy's best features: her wit, gaiety and zest for life.

And while it focuses on Grealy and Patchett's friendship, TRUTH & BEAUTY may be better described as a study of human nature. Patchett writes about the intricacies of the human heart in THE MAGICIAN'S ASSISTANT, THE PATRON SAINT OF LIARS and BEL CANTO, and she tackles the subject once again in TRUTH & BEAUTY. The constant search for a love that seems to be right in front of a person's eyes is a recurring theme for Patchett, who weaves a beautiful if not frustrating story of a friendship that she worked diligently to maintain.

In life many people struggle to find reciprocal friendships in men and women. And, frequently, outsiders perceive even the best of friendships to be one-sided. This may also be the case here. Readers will complete TRUTH & BEAUTY with a keen appreciation for the love that exists between women, the unwavering loyalty that friends can maintain through years of turmoil and emotional trials. And while loyalty (as we see in this 257-page story) may falter occasionally, it can withstand the test of time. And perhaps even beyond.

--- Reviewed by Heather Grimshaw

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Summary: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BROKEN HEART AND A BRILLIANT MIND
Review: If you've read Lucy Grealy's book AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FACE, you must read Ann Patchett's book TRUTH & BEAUTY. Ann was Lucy's best friend and tells the story of their loving and literary friendship. Ann's book is filled with Lucy's letters. The book tells of how Lucy was taunted by kids and adults because of her facial cancer. Readers get to see into Lucy's heart and how because of her "ugly" face she thought no one would ever love her. yet she beds every man who says something nice to her out of a need to connect and feel "love.". this book is a fantastic look into the heart and mind of someone with a visible disability. it is about someone with a brilliant mind. and it's filled with triumph and tragedy. And if you haven't read AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A FACE, I recommend that too. In both books you'll see the life of a driven woman hoping her genius and writing abilities will save her from what she thinks is the tragedy of her disability and make someone love her and she will live happily ever after. Sadly Lucy died of a drug overdose a few years ago. was it an accident or suicide?? she was heartbroken. she never thought she would find love. but so many of her friends loved her.

Rating:
Summary: The Face of an Autobiography?
Review: In chronicling the events surrounding Ann Patchett's relationship with Lucy Grealy, the author has written neither a biography nor an autobiography, but instead an encomium. That Grealy touched Patchett's life is unquestionable, but Patchett seems unwilling or unable to offer more than surface insight into why she fostered an obviously non-reciprocal relationship with the urchin-like Grealy, who plopped into her life full tilt. Ann extolls Lucy's celebrity-like charisma, but by comparison that often makes Ann seem akin to a groupie. Too frequently Grealy comes across as a petulant child in the "maternalish" consternation of Patchett's voice.

The book is beautifully written, but the subject matter is not beautifully analyzed. I would have appreciated more of Patchett's insights and opinions about whether a relationship this intense and unbalanced was really a friendship at all. By the time the book ends, she clearly is still too raw to share this with us. If it had been written with the benefit of more time lapsing since Grealy's death, we might have also learned about the resulting philosophical changes in Patchett's "life without Grealy." As it stands, I fear the book serves as little more than an admittedly interesting footnote to Grealy's life.

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Summary: disturbing, but not for the reasons you'd imagine...
Review: Patchett is unquestionably a wonderful writer. I'd told several of my close female friends that I couldn't wait to read Truth & Beauty and then found myself telling them, Well, I read it, but it's quite disturbing and not at all for the reasons you'd imagine...

First, there is little balance. Ann Patchett keeps herself at a safe remove, yet serves up every detail of Lucy Grealy for the reader. Patchett perhaps thought, Well, for the purposes of the book the reader doesn't need to know this or that detail from my personal and/or emotional life. And I'd agree. But I'm confused as to why she didn't then extend the same grace to her friend. Reading along, you think, Well, okay, she's telling me about the most achingly private moments of Lucy Grealy's life, then she will certainly balance it with some bit of refection on her own inner life. To say to the reader: This too, is who I am: flawed, human. And here were some of my struggles with self-esteem and sexuality etc. And okay, maybe it appears I have a saint complex, but the truth is...Well, that's the problem: the truth is...? You have no idea. And you start to wonder why you are reading the book at all, because the absence of Patchett grappling with the questions the book calls up, leaves you feeling simply voyeuristic. In the end, I wanted less salacious detail about Grealy and more analysis of the friendship. More emotional truth.

Second, though I've never read any of Grealy's work, it's clear that this was a tragic loss of an immensely gifted writer. Ann Patchett brought that home to me. So it was a disappointment that a portion of the book's proceeds are not marked for a writing fellowship or children's cancer charity in Grealy's name. To me, that would have been the true posthumous act of friendship, to have Patchett's writing gift help Lucy Grealy's spirit to live on in others.

Rating:
Summary: A friendship...
Review: Truth & Beauty chronicles the friendship of two women, Ann Patchett and Lucy Grealy. What makes the friendship unique is that both women are writers, and Lucy is a cancer survivor that has endured years of reconstructive facial surgery.

Ann Patchett is truly a superb writer, and leads the reader to craft images of friendship, devotion, and acceptance that stay in your mind long after you have finished the book. Despite Lucy's health, there is no pity in their relationship and Patchett is honest enough to admit that at times she envied Lucy.

The beauty of Patchett's words can also be a barrier, and although the reader can believe the love the two women shared, it is difficult to understand or internalize. Ann's need to chronicle the friendship as yet another tribute to Lucy. Even planning to save their letters, betting they would be famous in the future, is more for preservation than financial gain.

I did struggle with the book in that I found it difficult to understand why Patchett's love and faith in Lucy was so enduring. It is not disbelievable, in fact, the book does such a good job of making you believe it is true, you feel that you are being asked to take it on faith that this was a relationship that was joyous for Ann.

Definitely worth reading, if only for Patchett's skill alone, but be prepared to be somewhat unsettled at the end.

Rating:
Summary: Not recommended for tender sensitivities
Review: Well written, strangely powerful and often horrifying. I can't quite recommend it. It's a special sort of pathology that many of us have encountered.