Hello, and welcome to my first KZread book talk! Each month, I'll share thoughts and insight into a different literary work. Watch me as you prepare for own book club's discussion, or play my video during your meeting!
Today, I'm discussing "There There," a runaway and shatteringly beautiful bestseller by debut novelist Tommy Orange.
Spoiler level: low/moderate.
P.S.: Here's the Louise Erdrich quote referenced in "There There" and of course, this video!
“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won't either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”
― Louise Erdrich, "The Painted Drum"